
Class 
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copyright DErosrr. 




Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 



^Vcy-t7-CJL-eo€^^^" 






THE LIFE OF 

THEODORE 
ROOSEVELT 



BY 

WM. DRAPER LEWIS, Ph.D. 



FORMER DEAN OF THE LAW SCHOOL 
OF THE UNIVERSITY OF PENNSYLVANIA 



WITH AN INTRODUCTION BY 

WILLIAM HOWARD TAFT 

EX-PRESIDENT OF THE UNITED STATES 



ILLUSTRATED 



THE JOHN C. WINSTON COMPANY 

Philadelphia Chicago 



Copyright, 1919 
By WM. ELLIS SCULL 



©O.A525426 

APR 19 1919 



CONTENTS 

Chapter p AGE 

Introduction vii 

By William Howard Taft 

I. The Typical American 17 

II. Childhood 25 

III. School and College 40 

IV. First Plunge into Politics .... 52 
V. Elkhorn Ranch 68 

VI. Roosevelt and the Civil Service . 84 

VII. Police Commissioner 98 

VIII. Assistant Secretary of the Navy . 119 

IX. Colonel of the Rough Riders 134 

X. Governor of New York 148 

XI. From Governor to President ... 163 

- XII. Roosevelt in the White House . . 175 

.XIII. The First Term 194 

XIV. The Panama Canal 216 

y XV. The Campaign of 1904 229 

XVI. President in His Own Right . . . 238 

XVII. What He Did for the Navy . . . 259 

XVIII. Big Business and Labor 274 

XIX. Conservation of Natural Resources 288 

XX. In the Heart of Africa 301 

(v) 



VI 



Chapter 

XXI. 

XXII. 
XXIII. 



XXIV. 

XXV. 

XXVI. 

XXVII. 

XXVIII. 

XXIX. 

XXX. 



CONTENTS 

Paqb 

The Beginning of the Progressive 

Movement 319 

The Right of the People to Rule 336 
The Fight for the Nomination in 

1912 346 

The Founder of a New Party. . . 368 

Roosevelt the Naturalist .... 384 

The River of Doubt . 401 

Political Career after 1912. . . . 415 

Books and Speeches 432 

Life at Sagamore Hill 447 

The World War — His Last Great 

Service 459 

Chronology 473 

Index 475 



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INTRODUCTION 

By William Howard Taft 

DR. LEWIS has asked me to write this introduction 
to his narrative history of Theodore Roosevelt. 
Dr. Lewis is a teacher and publicist, of wide 
experience and intimate knowledge of his subject, a man 
of high character and discrimination, with whom this 
history is a labor of love. He will write an impartial, 
non-partisan history of this great man, whom he knew 
personally, and with whose views he deeply sympathized. 
That he shall entirely escape the influence of his great 
personal affection for Theodore Roosevelt in the history 
he writes is not to be expected. Indeed no history written 
so soon after the passing of a great historical figure 
like Roosevelt, while the magnetic influence of his per- 
sonality is strong, could fail to show the effect of that 
influence. But Dr. Lewis is able with judicial poise to 
tell the events of Roosevelt's life and give to the world 
the benefit of his personal observation. He will thus 
explain much, and greatly aid the future historian, 
who, after fifty years, shall write a life like that of Lord 
Charn wood's "Life of Lincoln.' ' 

Theodore Roosevelt was a scholar and a man of wide 
and exact knowledge in many fields. He was a scholar 
in the true sense, but no one ever quite classed him as 
such, because he made his scholarship a constant instru- 
ment in his practical activities. He was a thinker and 
used his acquisition of knowledge and learning to regulate 
that thinking. His marvelous power of quick acqui- 

(vii) 



viii INTRODUCTION 

sition was only a tool in solving practical problems, 
political and social. More than any one I know, he 
believed in results. More than any one I know, he 
demanded success in effort by those who were associated 
with him in a common cause. He was the advocate 
and exemplar of continuous struggle toward a definite 
object and a strenuous life. To say, therefore, that 
he was a scholar in politics is misleading, because that 
phrase suggests one in whose life the scholarly ambition 
is the controlling motive. To such a one, politics and 
statesmanship are a diversion or at least subordinate. 
Theodore Roosevelt was a statesman and he subor- 
dinated all his tastes and all his abilities and all his know- 
ledge and his facility in using that knowledge to the 
achievement of political and social progress. 

He was not a lawyer, though he had been admitted 
to the Bar. He believed in law and order. Indeed that 
was one of the primary principles of his faith. But 
he was impatient at the delays in the administration 
of justice. He was impatient at judicial judgments 
when he considered them wrong and destructive to 
progress. He was, therefore, without the most sensitive 
consideration of the methods by which that progress 
might be safely attained. Precedents and their influence 
which are essential in a judicial system, to secure 
uniformity in the application of the law, did not greatly 
appeal to him. 

The suddenness with which, four years after grad- 
uation, he sprang into national prominence in the con- 
vention which nominated Blaine in 1884, and the vigor 
and effectiveness that he then displayed was Minerva- 
like, as of one who sprang full armed from the brain 
of Jove. It was a prominence like that of the younger 



INTRODUCTION ix 

Pitt who had prepared himself for immediate respon- 
sibility as a member of the Cabinet upon his graduation. 
Like all men, Roosevelt grew and profited by actual 
experience; but one finds in his early political career 
all the characteristics which so conspicuously marked 
him to the day of his death. His humor, his courage, 
his love of a controversy, his love of, and insistence 
upon definite practical results, his impatience at what 
Senator Lodge has felicitously called the sacrifice of 
the good for the better, were all with him in the New 
York Assembly and in his preliminary convention 
support of Edmonds against Blaine and his subsequent 
earnest advocacy of Blaine as the nominee of the 
party. His adherence to party as the best means of 
accomplishing reform, without a slavish submission 
to the authority of those in temporary control, 
was as clear when he was Civil Service Commis- 
sioner and Police Commissioner as in the later years 
of his life. 

When one seeks to detail the important accom- 
plishment of Roosevelt's life in the definite objects 
attained, the roll is a very long and most important 
one; yet one hesitates to attempt it lest it minimize 
his career. His greatest achievement was in his influence 
upon the ideals of his country, and his stimulation 
of the plain people to appreciate them. We may 
note the detail of what he accomplished by way of 
illustration therefore rather than the summation of 
the total. 

One of the great evils of American political life in 
the days of Lincoln and of Grant was the use of public 
patronage down to the lowest tidewater for political 
purposes. Dorman B. Eaton and Governor Jenckes, 



x INTRODUCTION 

of Rhode Island, inaugurated a movement in which 
Senator George Pendleton afterwards took part, to 
introduce the competitive merit principle into the civil 
service. President Grant lent his aid to the beginning 
of the reform, though the actual practice in his admin- 
istration did not represent great advance. George 
William Curtis was the protagonist of civil service 
reform, and the controversies between him and Senator 
Conkling, who was reactionary in this regard, are part 
of its history. Civil service reform is not only dependent 
on enabling legislation, but it is still more dependent 
for real results upon actual executive practice. The 
act of 1883 gave sufficient power to the President to 
take tens of thousands of employees of the government 
out of politics and to prevent their being used as pawns 
in the political game. It left it to the President to make 
very comprehensive regulations and to include within 
the classified service whose limits he defined, the great 
bulk of civil servants. Congress always was, and even 
now is, a hypocrite in respect to the civil servants. The 
members who are of the right political faith hate to 
part with the prestige which, if unrestricted under our 
system, they are certain to enjoy. When, therefore, the 
bureau of the Civil Service was established, it was one 
of the constant congressional comedies that the appro- 
priations needed for its maintenance and the bureaus 
under its jurisdiction should be voted down in the com- 
mittee of the whole in which no record was made of 
who voted against the appropriation and then be restored 
to the appropriation bill by a vote in the House in 
which the ayes and nays were recorded. It was at a 
time when this comedy was going on that Theodore 
Roosevelt was appointed by Grover Cleveland to the 



INTRODUCTION xi 

Civil Service Commission, and he entered upon his 
duties with eagerness and enthusiasm and a very prac- 
tical knowledge of the evils sought to be remedied by 
the law. He had had an experience in ward and district 
politics and an understanding of politicians that fitted 
him for the fight he was to make. He was aggressive. 
He bothered the successive occupants of the White 
House with his request for stiffer regulations. He was 
outspoken in his contempt for the opposition which 
was generated only by a desire for political pap. He 
allowed no attack upon the system or its administration 
to go without a prompt, accurate and defiant answer. 
The sneers of Congressmen were supported by unfounded 
stories of the absurdity of examination questions put 
to applicants obviously not germane to the duties of 
the office sought. Roosevelt traced every one of these 
stories and refuted them all. It brought him into news- 
paper disputes with General Grosvenor and other mem- 
bers of Congress, whose accuracy he questioned and 
whose blunders or misstatements he demonstrated. 
He came near having a personal encounter with Frank 
Hatton, the editor and proprietor of the Washington 
Post, a former Assistant Postmaster General, who 
abused him with a virulence that Roosevelt seemed 
really to enjoy, because of the prominence it gave to 
the cause he was fighting. It is not too much to say 
that in stimulating executive responsibility for the 
progress of civil service reform and in securing progres- 
sive executive practice, the country is indebted to Theo- 
dore Roosevelt more than to any other man. No one 
pointed with more humor and telling denunciation to 
the injustice and outrage of using government office 
for personal and party political advancement than did 



xii INTRODUCTION 

he, and no one gave more practical proof of the possi- 
bilities of reform in this matter. 

His work as Police Commissioner gave him an oppor- 
tunity to approach the social side of New York City 
from the position of authority and responsibility and 
to gratify his interest in the lowly and the poor and the 
suffering which he had inherited from his father, and 
which stimulated him to constant thought as to methods 
for their practical relief. 

Roosevelt was a supporter of Thomas B. Reed for 
the Presidency, when Mr. Reed and Mr. McKinley 
were rivals for the nomination. Roosevelt and Reed 
were great friends. They were different. Reed was a 
brilliant epigrammist, a man of great personality, a 
master of trenchant speech, a conservative and not a 
reformer of the enthusiastic type, a believer in good 
government, a strong protectionist, a partisan Repub- 
lican. I have said Mr. Reed was not a reformer. This 
does him injustice. He was a fine parliamentarian and 
he saw the absurdity of a procedure that enabled the 
minority in a great legislative body like that of the 
House of Representatives, to block the action of the 
majority long after there had been given a full opportunity 
for debate. By his personal rulings and against riotous 
opposition and bitter abuse, he ended forever the ridic- 
ulous anomaly that a man might be present in the House 
and yet prevent his being counted as part of a quorum 
by refusing to answer to his name. Roosevelt interested 
Reed and Reed interested Roosevelt, and they were 
great friends. Each poked fun at the other, and the 
other enjoyed it. So Roosevelt supported Reed. Reed 
was beaten. There were those who were friends of 
McKinley, Reed and Roosevelt. They thought that 



INTRODUCTION xiii 

it might bring two great Republican leaders closer 
together if McKinley should appoint Roosevelt to be 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy. When the matter 
was pressed upon McKinley, he hesitated and replied, 
"But Roosevelt is always in such a state of mind," 
but he nevertheless appointed him. This remark, if 
properly understood, reveals the temperamental differ- 
ence between McKinley and his successor. Roosevelt's 
interest in the Navy had begun with his college days 
when he began the preparation of the Naval History 
of the War of 1812, a book which Senator Lodge, no 
mean authority, declares to be the best and most reliable 
history extant of that war upon the sea. Roosevelt's 
chief was Secretary Long. Secretary Long was a Unitarian 
of Quaker proclivities and not urgent in respect to pre- 
paration for a war. The differences between them 
because of this difference in attitude toward naval 
preparation, were numerous. Roosevelt did, however, 
succeed in putting on the Pacific station a squad- 
ron of war ships under the command of a real Com- 
mander like Dewey, with ammunition enough to fight 
a battle. 

The Spanish War Roosevelt saw coming before 
either his Secretary or his President. As soon as it 
came, he determined to be in it. There were many 
reasons of a personal and family character that would 
have held other men, but not Roosevelt. It was charac- 
terestic of him that he got to Cuba, that he was in a 
fight the day he landed, and that he was in all the land 
fights there were in that war. He had a real soldier's 
ambition, but he was never able to gratify it. No death 
would have satisfied him as well as death in battle. 
He longed for such an epic ending of his career. 



xiv INTRODUCTION 

As Governor of New York he practiced the principles 
of his life with reference to progress and politics. He 
found Piatt entrenched in power. He needed Piatt to 
accomplish his progressive purposes as Governor of 
New York, and he dealt with Piatt as the only way 
by which he could achieve progress. He was attacked 
and bitterly criticised by the professional reformers 
and the Mugwump and Democratic press, but he had 
the courage of his convictions and he followed 
them. 

Much happened in the seven and one-half years of 
his Presidency, but in such an introduction as this, 
there is no space for reference except to two or three 
great achievements. If the name of the Panama Canal 
could be changed, it should be called the "Theodore 
Roosevelt Canal." It is more due to him than to any 
other man, and without him it may well be doubted 
whether it would now be begun. The hoggish and unjust 
attitude of Colombia toward the enterprise as well as 
toward Panama, whose people favored giving the United 
States an opportunity to build and own it, aroused the 
deep indignation of Roosevelt. He knew there was no 
equity in the position of Colombia. He welcomed the 
possibility of a revolution which should separate Panama 
from Colombia. He thought such a revolution entirely 
justified, and so must everyone from the standpoint 
of equity and world progress. He did not promise aid 
to the revolutionists in advance of their declaration 
and rebellion. He did not scheme with any one to bring 
it about, but it was not difficult to infer in advance 
that a separation of that kind without his assistance 
was something of which he was likely to take advantage. 

When the revolution came on, he sent one order that 



INTRODUCTION xv 

should not have been sent. He directed the U. S. Naval 
Officer in charge at Colon not to allow Colombia to send 
forces to attack within fifty miles of the Panama Rail- 
road, lest it should injure American interests. The 
order was never executed. The Colombian troops did 
reach the railroad and the order had no real effect upon 
events. But it served to make a basis for the charge 
upon the administration that the United States actually 
intervened to make the revolution a success. The 
truth is the bond between Panama and Colombia was 
very loose. Colombia had not the power to prevent 
the separation, and what happened was a good thing 
to happen. Roosevelt's recognition of the Republic of 
Panama within a week after the establishment of the 
government there was very prompt. The signing of 
the treaty guaranteeing the integrity of Panama was 
equally expeditious. While these acts pressed upon 
the line of international right, in the light of all the 
circumstances history will sustain Roosevelt in what 
he did. It enabled us to make a treaty with a nation 
which owned the territory where the canal had to be 
built, and which was anxious to have it built and was 
anxious to have the United States build it. Therefore, 
it was glad to give the United States the complete con- 
trol over the Canal Zone. It was necessary for the 
United States to have this control, in order to succeed 
in the great work of construction. Without saying 
that the French plan under De Lesseps could ever 
have been carried through either in its original form 
or as amended, one of the great reasons for its failure 
was the fact that Colombia retained complete police 
control over the territory in which the canal was 
built. The governmental obstructions and corruption 



xvi INTRODUCTION 

were some of the most formidable obstacles to French 
success. These the Hay-Varilla treaty completely 
removed, and the police control and dominion that the 
United States acquired not only over the Canal Zone 
itself but for health purposes over the cities of Colon 
and Panama, made it possible to take the first indis- 
pensable step in building the canal, to wit, to make 
the Isthmus safe for the health of 40,000 people who 
had to be imported to do the building. Under the Colom- 
bian Hay-Herran treaty, no such control of the Zone 
was given to the United States. As was to be expected, 
after Congress gave the President the authority to 
build the canal, Roosevelt pressed its construction with 
one civil engineer and another, and finally with an 
army engineer, to a point where completion within a 
few years was a certainty. It was finished before the 
great war. Discussion as to who actually built the 
canal occasionally crops out. Suffice it to say that the 
man who really gave substance to the world dream of 
four hundred years and made the canal, was Theodore 
Roosevelt. The man whose executive genius did the 
detailed work was George W. Goethals. 

President Roosevelt was in full sympathy with his 
predecessors in the Philippine policy, and he held the 
anti-imperialists in the utmost scorn. The argument 
that the United States was not a full sovereign nation, 
able to hold and administer territory in any part of the 
world to which it had acquired legal title and possession, 
was entirely repugnant to him, and he spoke in con- 
demnation of such views with his accustomed vigor. 
Elihu Root, who had continued as Secretary of War 
from the McKinley Cabinet, was a man in whose counsel 
and ability he had the utmost reliance, and the change 



INTRODUCTION xvii 

from McKinley to Roosevelt made not the slightest 
interruption in the important work of bringing the 
Philippine Islands into order and preparing their people 
for autonomy. 

The great domestic policy of his second term was 
typified in the railroad rate bill. This gave to the Inter- 
state Commerce Commission the right to fix rates. 
Theretofore under the decision of the Supreme Court, 
it had only the right to declare rates fixed by the rail- 
way to be unreasonable. Around this rather slight 
step forward in government control raged the great 
contest of his administration. It brought him into open 
and acute issue with the great railroad interests of the 
country, and it developed him into a knight with shining 
armor against evils of corporate control in politics. He 
had shown a disposition to throw down the gauntlet 
to the great corporate organizations of the country 
in his first term, but upon the rate bill the issue was 
clearly drawn. All the corporate abuses, including the 
overissue of stock and high finance, received his con- 
demnation. He sought to stir the nation to the neces- 
sity for establishing a higher business standard than 
that which these corporate abuses indicated. This 
standard applied in the various directions which his 
universal interest suggested, created a body of doctrines 
that were called the Roosevelt Policies, and were tersely 
described in the homely phrase he used, as "Giving 
every man a square deal." Agitation over the power of 
wealth organized into corporations which in open and 
subterranean methods sought to control political con- 
ventions and legislative bodies did not begin with him. 
But certainly Theodore Roosevelt is entitled to the 
credit of assuming the leadership of this movement 



xviii INTRODUCTION 

and giving it effectiveness. The public under his prop- 
aganda became sensitive in the highest degree to cor- 
porate evils and entered upon radical measures which 
often went much too far and worked injustice. But 
such a result is to be expected where the indignation 
of the public is justly aroused. The unwise excesses of 
popular action are to be laid at the door of those who 
were guilty of creating the evil which aroused the 
people. 

Theodore Roosevelt was not a radical man. He 
believed in law and order. He believed in the right 
of property. He had sound economic views, but injustice 
aroused him and led him into denunciation that often 
was mistaken for a radicalism that he really did not 
entertain. His radicalism, such as he had, took the form 
of undervaluing the necessity for orderly procedure and 
of seeking a short cut to the reform of evil. He did 
not fully realize the ultimate results of such short 
cuts. 

Roosevelt was a friend of labor and believed in its 
organization and recognition. The wage earners knew 
that he sympathized with them. There was no doubt 
that he did. His earnest desire to better their con- 
dition was manifest in his speech and proposed 
measures. But he resented deeply abuses to which 
the power of organization sometimes tempted trades 
unions, and he did not hesitate to denounce such abuses. 
The criminal conspiracies of the Western Federation of 
Miners and the undesirable character of such citizenship 
as that of Moyer and Haywood he emphasized in speeches 
and in letters. He had no hesitation in sending a member 
of his Cabinet to fight the Western Federation of Labor 
in their attempt to defeat Governor Gooding of Idaho 



INTRODUCTION xix 

for re-election because he had issued the requisition 
papers which brought Moyer and Haywood from Col- 
orado to Idaho to be tried for the crime of killing Governor 
Steunenberg of that state. 

He used the Presidency as a pulpit from which to 
preach on many different subjects not within federal \ 
jurisdiction, but his interests were so universal and his 
knowledge of conditions so correct that he was able to 
be helpful in teaching lessons that the people gratefully 
read and approved. A cartoon hung in his room in the 
White House during his term, in which an old farmer 
with a pipe was seated in front of a fire reading a 
long executive message of the President, and underneath 
was the legend, "His favorite author." This cartoon 
contained the kernel of truth as to the attitude of the 
plain people in the country toward Theodore Roosevelt's 
ideals. At the instance of Gifford Pinchot, Roosevelt 
became very much interested in respect to the conser- 
vation of timber lands and of mineral resources of 
the United States from despoilers and fraudulent con- 
spiracies, and he initiated the vigorous prosecution of 
violation of federal laws on this subject. He was the 
first President to call a congress of governors to arouse 
the states to concurrent action. 

He was constantly getting up commissions to make 
investigations in fields where he thought good could 
be worked by changes. He appointed a Country Life 
Commission to see whether it was not possible in some 
way to make country life more attractive and to prevent 
the movement toward town. His commissions, after a 
while, rendered Congress impatient, and by statute it 
set specific limits to the President's power to appoint 
any commissions and to incur clerical and other expense 



xx INTRODUCTION 

in their transactions; but this legislation was not enacted 
in time to restrain him. It only affected his successors. 

His foreign policy was very vigorous. He asserted 
the Monroe Doctrine in the Venezuela matter. His 
action clarified the situation and prevented what might 
have become a violation of the Doctrine from reaching 
any such a point. He did not hesitate to become exceed- 
ingly active in seeking to bring peace between Japan and 
Russia. He wrote letters to the Emperor of Russia and 
the high authorities in Japan, and he exercised an influ- 
ence to secure the truce and the treaty that is most 
exceptional in the history of the United States and rare 
4 even in the history of European countries. 

I shall say nothing of his explorations except that he pas- 
sionately loved a study of nature, a study of fauna and the 
excitement of hunting. He revelled in the novels of Sienk- 
iewicz and talked them over by the hour with their transla- 
tor, Jeremiah Curtis. He studied and knew much about 
the Irish Sagas. His range of interests from the poetry of 
Celtic Ireland to "Nature Faking" reveals his boundless 
activity of mind. 

Theodore Roosevelt would have made a great war 
President. He would have selected, without regard 
to party or political embarrassment, the men whom 
he regarded as best adapted to do the work in the various 
departments. He would have imparted to his lieutenants 
a spirit and confidence of successful achievement that 
would have overcome any obstacles. He had not only 
the dynamic force himself, but he had the power of 
communicating it to his subordinates and he could 
diffuse his spirit through the entire government down 
to the last messenger boy. There would have been 
an utter absence of fear that some subordinate of his 



INTRODUCTION xxi 

would rob him of credit as a leader, and his joy at success 
in any department would have led him to do more than 
justice in his public appreciation. He would have made 
the government move as one man. He would have 
been merciless in cutting off heads of men whether 
good or bad who could not do their job. Into every 
department and field of preparation, no matter how 
technical or complicated, he would have entered and 
with his lightning facility for acquisition, he would 
have learned enough to understand success or failure 
and would have acted on his judgment. 

I venture to conclude with something I have said 
of Mr. Roosevelt in another place: 

"Mr. Roosevelt, earlier than any other public man, 
saw the real issues in this war, and with characteristic 
courage demanded what the majority thought unwise, 
intervention by our government. He urged, with pro- 
phetic vision, adequate preparation for the struggle 
he saw about to be forced upon us. He suffered much 
in mind and soul as he saw things left undone by our 
government which he deemed essential to national 
safety and the performance of national duty. For over 
and above everything, Theodore Roosevelt was a deeply 
patriotic American. He had intensified his passionate 
love of his country that was natural in him by acquiring 
an intimate knowledge and a profound appreciation 
of the great sacrificial struggle needed to make her 
great. He left no doubt of his willingness himself to 
render the ultimate sacrifice in her behalf. His spirit 
of patriotic devotion was web and woof of his 
character. 

"He sent his four boys forth to war with the pride 
of a Roman tribune. Through his father's tears for 



XX11 



INTRODUCTION 



Quen tin's death, there shone the stern joy that a son 
of his had been given to die the death he would himself 
have sought on the field of battle in his country's cause. 

"Theodore Roosevelt's example of real sacrifice 
was of inestimable value to our country in this war. 
The nation has lost the most commanding, the most 
original, the most interesting and the most brilliant 
personality in American public life since Lincoln." 




AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

THOSE who knew Theodore Roosevelt best honored 
him the most sincerely, not simply because they 
loved him, but because the intimacy of friendship 
showed no pettiness or meanness in him. 

My object has been to write the story of his life in 
such a way that the reader may not only know the 
main incidents of his full, joyous and varied career, 
and gain a correct idea of his great public services, 
but also come to know the man himself, his ideals, the 
motives of his public acts, and the road which he believed 
America must travel to be worthy of her place among 
the nations. 

During that period of his life when he was the object 
of bitter partisan attacks, I met hundreds of men and 
women who mistook his motives and had a grotesquely 
false idea of his personality. It is a satisfaction to know 
that the War gave him an opportunity to render a great 
service to his country and the world, and that that 
service was one which the majority of his former oppo- 
nents could and did appreciate. As a result, before 
his death, former misunderstandings were in great 
part swept away. My hope is that this book will help 
to end forever any misconceptions of the man and his 
purposes that may yet remain. 

It is needless to say that I have turned more often 
to his own books and articles than to any other source 
of information. It may be doubted whether any public 
man has ever left so large a collection of first-hand 
material for the assistance of his biographers. Through- 
out his life he was a constant writer of letters, addresses, 

(xxiii) 



xxiv AUTHOR'S PREFACE 

editorials, articles and books. His Autobiography, while 
not a complete history, includes many of the incidents 
of his life down to the end of his Presidency, and many 
of his personal impressions. Unless the quotation indi- 
cates a different source, where I have quoted his own 
words the quotation is drawn from this work. 

Much of the information and many of the incidents 
I have given could not have been recorded had it not 
been for the generous kindness of many friends of Colo- 
nel Roosevelt's and of mine who have placed at my 
disposal letters, diaries and other original material 
relating to his personal characteristics and to important 
events. I also here desire to acknowledge my great 
obligation to Mr. Shippen Lewis, of the Philadelphia 
Bar, who has given much of his time and thought to 
help me in the preparation of the book. 

Wm. Draper Lewis. 

Law School 

University of Pennsylvania 

March 6, 1919. 



CHAPTER I 

The Typical American 

THE news that Theodore Roosevelt was dead 
stunned America on the morning of January 6, 
1919. The approaching Peace Conference in Paris, 
the dark cloud of Bolshevism advancing from Russia over 
Poland and East Germany, events big with civilization's 
future, were for the time being forgotten. In spirit, mil- 
lions of the American people stood in the room of the un- 
pretentious house on the outskirts of the little village of 
Oyster Bay where the man each felt he knew lay dead. 

The death of no other man could have brought such 
a universal sense of personal loss, a sense of loss which 
actual acquaintance served but to deepen and intensify. 
This was not because he had for seven and a half years 
been President of the United States and throughout the 
major part of his working life had held public office. It 
was not because he had been a leader in momentous polit- 
ical contests nor because the record of his public service is 
full of things done of enduring value. Neither was it be- 
cause of his wonderfully diversified ability. Since Caesar, 
perhaps no one has attained among crowding duties and 
great responsibilities such high proficiency in so many 
separate fields of human activity. His knowledge of his- 
tory was equaled by few. As a naturalist he won for him- 
self a recognized position in the front rank. He was a 
great explorer and hunter of wild game. Several of his 
books are more than well written and more than one of 
his speeches will live among the enduring utterances of 
our great statesmen. 

2 (17) 



18 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

It was, however, something more than any one or all 
of these things which gave him his hold on the affections 
of the American people. We may admire a public man 
for the things he has accomplished, for his brilliant and 
versatile ability; we may trust him because we believe 
in the wisdom of his judgment; but our affection only 
finds root in his character. 

Theodore Roosevelt was no exception to this rule. 
The attainments of his mind, the exalted office which he 
held, the momentous character of the work he accom- 
plished all served but to bring him to the attention of 
mankind. Knowing him, people loved him, not for these 
things, but for certain great qualities of character ex- 
pressed in his high sense of honor, his burning 
hatred of injustice, his deep sense of the obligation 
for personal service and, above all, his intense love for 
his country. 

Again, perhaps, not a little of our affection for him 
arose from the fact that he was very human, which is 
only another way of saying that he had faults. 

Once he told me that he had made many mistakes; 
but just to himself as to others, he quickly added: "If 
I had not been willing to risk making mistakes I would 
have accomplished nothing worth while." Somehow, 
we feel the same way about his faults — his occasional 
impatience of temper, his unconscious unfairness to 
those whose point of view towards public questions led 
them to oppose measures which he believed essential to 
the moral well-being of the country. After all, these 
and other faults and foibles were not serious. No one of 
them had its origin in coldness of heart, or in anything 
mean, or petty or low. They were not indexes to serious 
defects of character, but rather to his intense feeling 



THE TYPICAL AMERICAN 19 

for the enduring things of life — honor, truth, duty, 
service. He had the defects of his great qualities. 

Roosevelt is our typical American. Not that we are 
like him, but in that the worker in field, forest, mill and 
office, irrespective of financial position and social standing, 
sees in this great scholar and statesman, this vigorous, 
hearty, courageous out-of-door man, with his high ideals 
and intense love for the everyday simple things of life, 
the embodiment of a type which, above all others, he 
admires. 

The sense of personal loss referred to is too present 
and the public events in which he took part or discussed 
are too recent to make it possible to examine fully or 
weigh impartially the public measures he advocated or 
the wisdom of his criticisms. We are, however, better 
qualified than those who shall come after us to judge the 
effect of his words, his actions and his personality on the 
people of the United States. 

Many eulogies will hereafter be written upon his 
life's work, but we, his contemporaries, know that for us 
his greatest work is expressed in the simple statement: 
He raised the Ideals of the People. 

Compare the sordid commercialism, the low financial 
morale, the disregard of social welfare, prevalent in this 
country in the middle of the last quarter of the nineteenth 
century, with the awakened social conscience of modern 
America. No one pretends that our ideals as a people are 
perfect, or that we even live up to our ideals; but, on the 
other hand, we have traveled a long distance in the last 
three decades towards an America of which he dreamed 
— an America which should be a better place to live in, 
not for some of the people, but for all of the people. The 
man in the street as well as the student of public opinion 



20 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

knows that to Theodore Roosevelt, because of the truths 
he dared to tell and the influences he dared to fight, are 
due, more than to any other one man, the improvement 
in our financial practices and the higher, better ideals 
of the rising generation. 

Neither do we need the perspective of time to learn 
the simple, but all-important, lessons of the main events 
of his life. These events speak for themselves. They 
need no comment or criticism to teach again the need for 
hard work and often of great courage to attain any end 
which is worth while; or to impress on us the age-old truth 
that opportunity, though she may come in an unexpected 
form, comes only to him who is prepared to meet her. 
Men marvel at the great amount of work he accomplished. 
There are two reasons: One is found in the fact that his 
youthful struggle against delicate health had given him 
a sound body to be the servant of his restless energy; 
the other is that he cultivated his tastes and ordered his 
time so that, though he played more than most busy men 
and usually obtained sufficient rest and relaxation, he 
never wasted or frittered away his time. The value of the 
conservation of time, of the relaxation which comes from 
complete change of mental occupation especially after 
moments of intense excitement, is the lesson he taught 
everyone who came into working contact with him. 
Twenty minutes after killing an elephant in an African 
jungle and being near death in the subsequent stampede 
of the others, found him reading Balzac. In the midst of 
the excitement of the Chicago Convention of 1912, the 
writer can bear witness that he spent every moment of 
the time that he was not needed reading Herodotus. 

Of his physical courage the stories are innumerable. 
In this, or indeed any other history of his life, it is only 



THE TYPICAL AMERICAN 21 

possible to make a selection. He could fire as coolly and 
accurately at the charging lion or rhinoceros, where to 
miss meant serious injury or death, as at a mark. He 
could venture on a hazardous journey down an unknown 
river and risk death from disease and exhaustion in the 
tropical jungle of Central South America. He could 
face a great audience and make the speech he had prom- 
ised to make, within a few minutes after being shot by 
a would-be assassin, and when he had no certainty that 
the shot would not prove fatal. He did not believe that 
he was especially brave. He thought that by conscious 
effort he had gained control over his nerves. Be it so. 
Few men gain such complete control. 

There are innumerable instances also of his moral 
courage that make inspiring reading. I believe the highest 
test of courage in a public man is his willingness, if neces- 
sary, to accomplish an object he regards as right, to face 
the certainty of being misunderstood by those whose 
good opinion he earnestly desires. Colonel Roosevelt, 
on more than one occasion, proved that he had this kind 
of moral courage. 

In the fall of 1911, and the early part of 1912, he was 
confronted with a political situation which required him 
to decide whether he would become a candidate for the 
Republican nomination. Politicians of the Progressive 
wing of the Republican party flocked to Oyster Bay. 
They assured him that he could win the nomination, and, 
nominated, would be triumphantly elected. Always 
underestimating his own political strength, he had no 
idea at the time that he could be nominated. He knew 
that if he made the contest for the nomination, his motives 
would be misunderstood, not only by his political oppo- 
nents, but by many whose continued confidence he desired 



22 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

more, perhaps, than he desired anything else in the world, 
except to do the right as it was given to him to see the 
right. Knowing that he would be thus misunderstood, 
he made the contest because he believed that by so doing 
he would advance, not his own political fortunes, but the 
cause of orderly progress to better social and industrial 
conditions; that he could, in this way, most effectively 
combat those forces of reaction which, if not overcome, 
in the end would drive the country to violent revolution. 
Students of his life and times will always differ as to 
whether his judgment was correct and his action wise; but, 
unlike many of his contemporaries, they will not mis- 
understand his motives; they will appreciate the moral 
courage with which he faced the disapproval and mis- 
understanding of life-long friends. 

As he saw the truth, so he spoke it. It was not that he 
did not care for his own future, or was not accustomed to 
consider the effect of word or action. On the contrary, 
as a politician, he wanted support from all kinds of people, 
and he was always willing to use every honorable means 
to secure support for himself, his party or his political 
ideals. He was a past master in the art of handling men, 
and making them do what he wanted them to do. But 
by conscious effort, as a young man, he had so schooled 
himself that he never balanced what he regarded as right 
to say or do against its possible effect on his own fortune. 
No man was so highly placed in the political or business 
world that he feared to publicly condemn him. No 
interest or class was so powerful that it could control his 
action against his judgment. He could send a mes- 
sage to Congress which he knew would alienate the 
political support of some special interest. He could 
insist on the retention of a non-union man in the Govern- 



THE TYPICAL AMERICAN 23 

ment printing office, against the vigorous protest of union 
labor, or tell a delegation of strikers that he would call 
out United States troops if there was the slightest dis- 
order, though the very object of their visit was to secure 
his assurance that the troops would not be used. 

Like all other of our great statesmen who have won 
a permanent place in the affections of the people, he had 
an intense love for his country. It is said that his whole 
life was an expression of "Jubilant Americanism." And 
this is so, if by it we mean that his life was an exuberant 
expression of dynamic force, a triumphant assertion of 
his country's greatness. With him, this love for country 
was based on complete knowledge. He knew his country's 
history as few men knew it. No other public man of his 
own or any other time was so intimately and personally 
acquainted with the conditions environing the life, with 
the outlook, and with the best aspirations of so many 
different classes. He could count among his personal 
friends officers of the army and navy, diplomats, pub- 
licists, professors, naturalists, hunters of big game, editors, 
explorers, ranchmen, social workers, captains of industry, 
labor leaders, Catholic priests, Protestant clergymen and 
Jewish rabbis. He was personally acquainted with every 
part of the country. His campaign trips had taken him 
to every state and to every town of consequence. He had 
spent summers in the Maine woods and on the Western 
plains; he had hunted grizzlies in the Rockies, visited 
remote Indian tribes in the great American desert, drilled 
troops in Texas, and herded cattle on the Little Missouri. 
At will he could visualize and describe the physical aspect 
of any mountain, stream, plain or desert he had ever 
seen, as only those can who are at once, as he was, a good 
naturalist, a keen huntsman and a lover of nature. 



24 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Knowing his country, he was infinitely removed from 
the politician whose stock-in-trade is a loud-mouthed 
boasting of our superiority to others. With clear vision 
he saw, not only the good, but the defects in our national 
character and the dangers of the future. These defects 
and dangers he did not hesitate to point out. Unblinded 
by her faults, he knew and loved America as she is; spend- 
ing himself joyously to help her become the country of 
his dreams. I say joyously, because throughout his life, 
to the very end, there abided in him perfect faith in her 
glorious destiny. 



CHAPTER II 

Childhood 

JUST six years after the English Pilgrims landed on 
Plymouth Rock a company of Dutch emigrants, led 
by Peter Minuit, sailed up "the finest harbor in the 
world' ' and disembarked on a long, narrow island which 
the Indians had named Manhattan. Minuit bought this 
island, on which the best part of New York City is now 
located, for sixty guilders, or twenty-four dollars. Other 
pilgrims soon followed Peter Minuit's party. When the 
white settlement numbered about two hundred souls, 
they named the region New Netherland and its flourish- 
ing metropolis New Amsterdam. 

Eighteen years later, in 1644, the first of the Roosevelt 
family came from Holland to settle in this country. His 
name was Klaes Martensen Van Roosevelt. This ances- 
tor of the Roosevelt family was, like the forefathers of most 
Americans, an immigrant who came to the New World 
presumably to make his fortune, naturally choosing the 
Dutch settlement of New Amsterdam as his new home. 
When Klaes Van Roosevelt reached Manhattan Island, 
he found on it a cosmopolitan town of four hundred or 
five hundred inhabitants who spoke eighteen different 
languages. The satisfaction of the worthy Dutchman 
and of his descendants with the city of his choice is indi- 
cated by the fact that every Roosevelt in the line from 
Klaes to Theodore has been born on Manhattan Island. 

New Netherland and New Amsterdam both became 
New York, and the Dutch province became a British 

(25) 



26 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

colony and then an American State. But for nearly two 
centuries the old Dutch families retained their ancestral 
language and many of the habits of their forbears. The 
Roosevelts prospered, as did others of the original set- 
tlers' descendants. One of the Roosevelts bought a large 
tract of land on the lower end of Manhattan Island which 
is now called the Battery, and there built his home. As 
the city increased in size, its lower part became more and 
more given over to business, and the old families were 
compelled to move farther and farther up town. 

Theodore Roosevelt's grandfather, Cornelius Van 
Schaack Roosevelt, lived in a big house at Fourteenth 
Street and Broadway. "Inside," said the Colonel years 
afterwards, "there was a large hall running up to the roof; 
there was a tessellated black and white marble floor, and 
a circular staircase round the sides of the hall, from the 
top floor down. We children much admired both the tes- 
sellated floor and the circular staircase. I think we were 
right about the latter, but I am not so sure as to the tes- 
sellated floor." Cornelius Roosevelt was a substantial 
citizen who had not only his business but a considerable 
fortune inherited from his father. He studied at Colum- 
bia College and then entered business as a glass mer- 
chant, an occupation to which he devoted himself for 
most of his life. He was deeply interested in charitable 
enterprises and gave largely to their support. Theodore 
Roosevelt, Sr., the father of the President, was the son of 
Cornelius, and succeeded him in the glass business. Like 
his father, he had an ample fortune and every social 
advantage of the city of New York. 

There was nowhere in the United States a more exclu- 
sive circle than the descendants of the original Dutch 
settlers of New York City. Washington Irving has so 



CHILDHOOD 27 

well portrayed them in his "History of New York," writ- 
ten under the pen name of Diedrich Knickerbocker, that 
the word Knickerbocker has come to represent the city's 
best in lineage. The Roosevelt family was and is a Knick- 
erbocker family, and it is important to remember that 
fact in reading Theodore Roosevelt's life. He had the 
advantages and the disadvantages which come with social 
position, wealth, culture and refinement. From the 
beginning of his public life to its end he had the gift of 
easy personal approach to all sorts and conditions of 
men. He was at home in the mountains with hunters 
and, on the plains, with cow-punchers; but he was 
equally at home in the White House receiving distin- 
guished foreigners, or in a New York ball-room. This 
was one of the advantages of a heritage of culture, when 
combined, as in Roosevelt's case, with an intense interest 
in people. The disadvantage, of course, lay in the fact 
that wealth and culture open interests not shared by those 
who do not possess them, and these very interests un- 
shared by the average citizen, prove a barrier to political 
success in a democracy. He had to show that the compar- 
ative luxury of his upbringing had not deprived him of 
the ability to fend for himself, and what was more import- 
ant, of the ability to understand and sympathize with 
men and women of social environments other than his own 
Into such a family, then, Theodore Roosevelt was 
born on October 27th, 1858. The long dispute between 
the North and the South was rapidly taking on a more 
and more sinister aspect. In a final vain effort to bridge 
the chasm by compromise, the voters had united to 
elect a Democratic President, — destined to be the last 
Democrat in the White House till over twenty years 
should pass. Men were widely interested in political 



28 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

questions as they have probably never been interested 
since. It was a suitable time for the birth of a man who 
was to give the greater part of his life to public service. 

The house in which the Roosevelts lived and in which 
Theodore was born stood at 28 East Twentieth Street, 
in New York City. It was then a good-sized city house 
furnished in the solid, rather gloomy style which was gen- 
erally accepted in New York sixty years ago. 

Roosevelt's father, Theodore, Sr., had a strong influ- 
ence on the future President's life and character, although 
he died when his son was only nineteen years old. Of him 
President Roosevelt said, "My father was the best man 
I ever knew. " He was a busy man and a happy one, in 
which respects the Colonel resembled him. He was a 
devoted husband and father, a successful merchant and 
a tireless helper of the helpless. It was said of him after 
his untimely death at the age of forty-six that he was 
"a man of untiring energy, and of prodigious industry, 
the most valiant fighter of his day for the right, and the 
winner of his fights." 

He was in the prime of his youth when the Civil 
War brought its many problems to be solved. Those 
were four hard years for the Roosevelts. The Bulloch 
family of Georgia, of which the boy's mother was a 
member, were active and influential on the side of 
the South. Little Theodore's uncle, Captain James 
D. Bulloch, had been in the United States Navy, Re- 
signing at the opening of the war, he offered his serv- 
ices to the new Confederate government, and was sent to 
England to buy arms for the Confederacy. Then he was 
commissioned to purchase and equip vessels there to 
fight battles for the South. In spite of the protests of the 
government of the United States, Captain Bulloch man- 



CHILDHOOD 29 

aged to equip and float a half dozen ships flying the flag 
of the Confederacy. One of these was the Alabama, which 
did so much damage that Great Britain, after the war, 
was compelled by arbitration to pay to the United 
States $15,000,000 for having allowed Captain Bulloch 
to build her in an English port. 

Irvine Stephens Bulloch, a younger brother of Mrs. 
Roosevelt, also enlisted in the Confederate Navy, and was 
a middy on the Alabama during her battle with the 
Kearsarge off the coast of France. When the Southern 
warship was sunk by the Kearsarge, young Bulloch com- 
manded the gun which fired the last shot aboard the 
Alabama before she went down. He was rescued by men 
from an English yacht, and afterward married the daugh- 
ter of one of his British rescuers. Young Theodore Roose- 
velt had reason to be proud of the character and ability 
of his Southern uncles, though he believed that they 
fought on the wrong side. 

The sufferings and sorrows of the war appealed 
strongly to Roosevelt the father. He did all he could to 
befriend and improve the condition of the soldier. He was 
a founder of the Union League, organized for the purpose 
of rallying men, money and munitions to carry on the 
cause of the North. He was also one of the first in getting 
in order the Sanitary Commission, which did much for 
the health and benefit of the soldiers at the front. Dur- 
ing the war, in addition to all these labors, he devoted 
much time to caring for the sick and wounded, as well 
as for the families and widows and orphans of soldiers. 
He drafted the Act of Congress which enabled soldiers to 
allot part of their pay to their dependants and was ap- 
pointed by President Lincoln as one of the commissioners 
to carry the act into effect in New York. In pursuance 



30 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of his duties as a commissioner he traveled about among 
New York regiments at the front and induced many sol- 
diers then wasting their wages to assign certain monthly 
amounts to their families. 

When thousands of soldiers returned to New York 
City at the end of the war, with no means of livelihood, 
he organized at his own house, the Soldiers' Employment 
Bureau. A great number of the soldiers had not received 
their pay from the government, and so-called claim agents 
pretended to get their money for them x but robbed them 
instead. To combat this end, Roosevelt helped to form 
the Protective War Claims Association. 

Besides all this, he was president of the State Board 
of Charities and an active participant in the work of other 
similar organizations. He was particularly interested in 
societies to prevent cruelty to children and cruelty to 
animals. The Newsboys' Lodging-Houses were an effec- 
tive means of keeping boys off the street, and Mr. Roose- 
velt took an active interest in them. Years afterwards 
one of these newsboys was Governor Brady of Alaska and 
served under his former benefactor's son. Under Pres- 
ident Hayes, Mr. Roosevelt served as Collector of the 
Port of New York. 

But with all these manifold activities,, Theodore 
Roosevelt, Sr., had plenty of time for his family. His 
son relates that he and his brother and sisters used to wait 
in the library in the evening until they heard their father's 
front door key rattling in the latch and then they would 
rush out to greet him and troop after him into his room 
while he was dressing for dinner. There they were regaled 
with novelties which their father extracted from his pocket 
for their amusement and with the trinkets which he kept 
in a little box on his dressing-table, which the children 



CHILDHOOD 3i 

always spoke of as "treasures." On special occasions 
each child would receive a special trinket for his "very 
own." Often, in the summer, Mr. Roosevelt would com- 
plete his business and take an early train to the country, 
where he and Mrs. Roosevelt had taken the children 
for their yearly outing. Mrs. Roosevelt and one or 
two of the children would meet him at the station in a 
four-in-hand, which he delighted to drive, and away they 
would all go at what appeared to the boy a tremendous 
pace. All this kind of family intimacy formed the basis 
of the strong love which Theodore had for his father. 

Long after his father's death, Roosevelt said of him 
that his father was the only man of whom he was ever 
really afraid, adding, "I do not mean that it was a wrong 
fear, for he was entirely just, and we children adored 
him." On one occasion only did the father administer 
corporal punishment to his son Theodore. It appears that 
Theodore had bitten his elder sister's arm and had in- 
stantly taken refuge, first in the yard and then under the 
kitchen table, from the punishment which he knew he 
deserved. His father followed him and, discovering his 
presence under the table, dropped on all fours and darted 
for him. The boy feebly hurled a handful of dough at his 
pursuer, and then ran for the stairs. Half way up the 
stairs his father caught him and administered the pun- 
ishment which he afterwards acknowledged that he 
richly deserved. 

Of his mother, Martha Bulloch, Roosevelt said, " She 
was a sweet, gracious, beautiful Southern woman, a 
delightful companion and beloved by everybody. She 
was entirely 'unreconstructed' to the day of her death." 
Mrs. Roosevelt had been born and brought up in a typ- 
ical Southern atmosphere. Her grandfather, Gen. Daniel 



32 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Stewart, had joined the Revolutionary Army when a boy, 
was captured by the British and escaped from one of the 
enemy's prison ships. After his escape he served in the 
Continental Army as a captain under Sumter and Marion. 
Mrs. Roosevelt lived during her childhood at Roswell, 
Georgia, and was familiar with all of the delightful darky 
characteristics and stories which Joel Chandler Harris has 
immortalized in "Uncle Remus." Theodore Roosevelt, 
Jr., never saw his mother's birthplace until October 20, 
1905, when he was forty-seven years old. He told the 
citizens of that little town, then, how deeply he was moved 
by coming to the place of which he had heard so much 
from her, and called attention to his great good fortune 
in having the right to claim that his blood was half South- 
ern and half Northern. Indeed, although his convictions, 
as a boy and as a man, were entirely with the Northern 
cause, he always had a sympathetic understanding of the 
Southern point of view, due, in part at least, to his love 
for his "unreconstructed" mother. 

All through the Civil War the father was a strong 
Lincoln Republican and the mother a strong secessionist, 
but this did not interfere with the affection and unity of 
the family. The Colonel relates that towards the close of 
the war he grew to have a partial but alert understand- 
ing of the family difference, "and once," he says, "when 
I felt that I had been wronged by maternal discipline 
during the day, I attempted a partial vengeance by pray- 
ing with loud fervor for the success of the Union arms, 
when we all came to say our prayers before my mother in 
the evening. She was not only a most devoted mother, 
but was also blessed with a strong sense of humor, and 
she was too much amused to punish me; but I was warned 
not to repeat the offense, under penalty of my father's 



CHILDHOOD 33 

being informed — he being the dispenser of serious punish- 
ment." 

There were three other children in the Roosevelt 
family, Anna, who was three year older than Theodore, 
and his younger brother and sister, Elliot and Corinne, 
who were his juniors by one and three years respectively. 
Mrs. Roosevelt's mother, Mrs. Bulloch, also lived with 
the family, and a young unmarried aunt, Anna Bulloch. 
There were also as associates of his early childhood his 
cousins, two of whom lived next door, and Edith Carow, 
a friend of his sister Corinne's, who lived not far away on 
Union Square and who was, years later, to become his wife. 

Altogether this group of youngsters seem to have led 
a very happy, wholesome, normal life. During the winter 
they lived at the house on Twentieth Street, while during 
the summer they were always taken somewhere in the 
country. Of course they enjoyed the country very much 
more than the city. There they had all kinds of pets — 
cats, ducks, rabbits, a racoon and a Shetland pony named 
General Grant, for whom the Colonel's children named 
their own pony thirty years later. Christmas and Thanks- 
giving were times of special pleasure, as they are for most 
children. On Christmas Eve each child hung up the 
largest stocking which could be borrowed from the grown 
members of the family, and before dawn on Christmas 
morning they were all seated on their parents' bed explor- 
ing the treasures which had so miraculously arrived 
during the night. After breakfast the bigger Christmas 
presents were found in the drawing-room, each child's 
presents arranged on a separate table. "I never knew 
anyone else," said the Colonel, "have what seemed to me 
such attractive Christmases, and in the next generation 
I tried to reproduce them exactly for my own children." 



34 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Next door to Theodore Roosevelt, Senior's house was 
that of his brother Robert. Both of these houses had 
wide porches looking upon the yards in the rear, and these 
porches formed the children's playground during the 
winters in the city. No doubt the future naturalist took 
special delight in the proximity of his uncle's house, be- 
cause its owners possessed, from time to time, tropical 
birds of beautiful plumage and, on one occasion, a monkey. 

During his early boyhood Theodore Roosevelt was 
sickly and delicate. From a very early age he suffered 
from asthma, which for years prevented him from sleep- 
ing except in a sitting posture. His later robust health 
was due partly to the loving care of his father and mother, 
and partly to his own determination to become strong. 
"One of my early memories," he says, "is of my father 
walking up and down the room with me in his arms at 
night when I was a very small person, and of sitting up 
in bed gasping, with my father and mother trying to help 
me." Often his father, in summer, would take him 
driving through the countryside in the darkness of night. 
Theodore recorded at one time in his diary, " T was sick 
of the asthma last night. I sat up for four successive 
hours and Papa made me smoke a cigar." The state- 
ment that he was "sick of the asthma last night" occurs 
frequently in this childish diary. 

In 1869 Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt took all the children 
on a long trip to Europe. To this trip Theodore did not 
look back afterwards with any particular pleasure. In 
fact he says that he cordially hated it, and that all the 
enjoyment that he and the other children got was in explor- 
ing ruins or mountains when they could get away from 
their parents, and in playing in the different hotels. The 
diary which he kept at the time bears witness to the 



CHILDHOOD 35 

truth of his later impressions. Of Oxford, for instance, 
he writes, "We drove around it and saw some colages." 
His record of the Lake country is confined to a brief 
statement about a climb at Windermere: "The view 
was splendid on the top and it was very windy and I 
bought a sweet cracker." At York they seem to have 
had a more interesting time, for he records that he and 
his sister Corinne went to the museum, "where we saw 
birds and skeletons and Bamie and I went in for a spree 
and got two shillings' worth of rock candy." But, taken 
as a whole, the diary certainly indicates a little boy who 
was asthmatic and bored and homesick a good deal of the 
time. When the family visited Europe again, four years 
later, he had matured sufficiently to enjoy his trip and 
to profit by it. 

His sister Corinne, now Mrs. Douglas Robinson of 
New York, has given me an intimate sketch of his early 
childhood : 

"My earliest impressions," she writes "of my brother 
Theodore are those of a rather small, patient, suffering 
little child, who, in spite of his suffering, was always the 
acknowledged head of the nursery at No. 28 East Twen- 
tieth Street in New York City, where my brother Elliot 
and I were his loving followers in any game which he 
initiated, or where we listened with intense interest and 
admiration to the stories which he wove for us day by 
day, and often even month by month. These stories 
almost always related to strange and marvelous animal 
adventures, in which the animals were personalities quite 
as vivid as Kipling gave to the world a generation later 
in his Jungle Books. 

"Owing to acute and often agonizing asthma, he showed 
as a little boy, none of the vigorous quality which became 



36 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

part of his very atmosphere later in life. I remember well, 
in the same house in Twentieth Street, that my father had 
the third room of the second floor turned into an outdoor 
piazza gymnasium, with see-saws, horizontal and vertical 
bars, swings, etc., and my brother always told me of the 
deep impression it produced upon him when my father 
took him for the first time to this outdoor gymnasium, and 
said: 'Theodore, you have the brains, but brains are of 
comparatively little use without the body; you have got 
to make your body, and it lies with you to make it, and it's 
dull hard work, but you can do it,' and from that day this 
little boy of about nine years old started to make his body, 
and he never ceased in making that body until the day of 
his death. But in those early years it was a difficult task. 
I can see him now faithfully going through various 
exercises, at different times of the day, to broaden the 
chest narrowed by this terrible shortness of breath, to 
make the limbs and back strong and able to bear the 
weight of what was coming to him later in life. 

"Perhaps one of his most striking characteristics as a 
very young boy was his power of concentration. From 
the very fact that he was not able originally to enter into 
the most vigorous activities, he was always reading or 
writing, and was always able to detach himself from what- 
ever environment he was in and become so absorbed in 
the book or paper which was the matter on his mind that 
he was entirely forgetful of w r hat was going on around 
him. This intense power of concentration, learned so 
young, served him well in later life. I have frequently 
seen him, on some of his many presidential trips, detach 
himself in just the same way that he did when he was a 
little delicate boy at the old home in Twentieth Street, 
and on those very presidential trips I have seen him devour 




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CHILDHOOD 37 

'Ferrero,' 'Josephus' and similar works, while dele- 
gations would come and go in the train, with whom he 
would have short conversations and then immediately 
absorb himself in his reading again. 

"I can remember perfectly the feeling of life and 
spirit with which the whole house was infused when he 
came into it. Interesting as he had been mentally as a 
little child, one had perhaps been over-conscious of the 
sense of detachment with which his suffering had sur- 
rounded him. Later, when he was a young man in the 
New York Assembly, while he could still summon that 
sense of detachment at will, and could give one, if he so 
desired, the impression of being in another world when 
studying or reading — at other times he was the life and 
spirit of the whole family environment, and his work in 
the Assembly, with its far-reaching interest, was even then 
the pivot upon which the whole family life turned. 
He was then, as later, capable of the most unflagging 
power of achievement, and his reading was so universal, 
and yet so specialized that one could turn to him as an 
authority upon almost any subject. 

"Owing to delicacy in childhood he was not able to go 
to a boarding school, and was educated, more or less, by 
tutors, and when my father first settled at Oyster Bay, 
Theodore, who was then a boy of about fourteen, was 
under the tutelage of Mr. Arthur H. Cutler, who later 
formed the big boys' school in New York City and was 
always extremely proud that Theodore Roosevelt had 
been his first pupil. 

"In those early days at Oyster Bay, when he was 
beginning to get the benefit of his own making of his own 
body, I remember him as a great lover of the water, but 
only in a very active way. He never cared, as my 



38 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

brother Elliot did, to sail a boat; it might be scientific and 
difficult to sail a boat, but it wasn't half hard enough to 
suit his tastes. He liked the smallest rowboat that could 
live in the bay and Sound, and he liked to row it for miles 
himself, carrying it across points or strips of sand, shoot- 
ing ducks, taking long trips when the waters were rough on 
the Sound, when the danger was sufficiently exciting to 
make it worth while to keep the tiny boat straight in the 
waves or fog. And as he shot and ran and rowed he grad- 
ually became a much stronger and hardier boy. He 
always retained his love of natural history, and literature 
of all sorts and kinds. 

"Those early days at Oyster Bay are perhaps the most 
vivid of our childhood, for my father and mother had a 
wise attitude toward their children — making compara- 
tively few rules, The rules that were made had to be 
strictly kept, but otherwise we were given great leeway, 
and were allowed to roam the then exquisite lanes of Long 
Island at will on horseback, or to spend long, happy holi- 
days on the bay and Sound. 

"Theodore, at this time, was collecting birds and ani- 
mals of various kinds, studying their habits, skinning and 
stuffing them himself, and at that period my father always 
felt that his taste for science would probably be the dom- 
inant factor in his life, although he encouraged the 'stren- 
uous life' in every possible way, feeling that the boy's 
body required the boxing lessons, the running con- 
tests and the various types of exercises in which he 
indulged. 

"At eighteen, Theodore Roosevelt, although occa- 
sionally suffering from his old enemy, was a strong and 
normal young man and perfectly able to go into Harvard 
College and hold his own against any of the light-weight 



CHILDHOOD 39 

boxers of that day, in spite of being handicapped, as he 
was, by near-sightedness from the beginning. 

"Just about the same time that he entered college 
he had begun to take long trips in the backwoods of 
Maine, under the guidance of the two fine Maine lumber- 
men — Bill Sewall and Bill Dow — who for so many years 
were a large influence in his physical and even his mental 
life. 

"His love of nature, accentuated by his knowledge of 
birds and beasts, was one of the very vital factors in his 
whole life, for he had that mixture of scientific interest 
and pure delight in the beauty of nature which rarely 
goes together. 

"When you ask my impressions of my brother as a 
boy and a young man, the qualities that stand out spe- 
cially before me are those qualities which meant in his 
extreme youth patience, concentration and determina- 
tion, and, in his maturer youth, equal determination, equal 
concentration, but with a greater physical power and 
courage added to those early qualities. There was an 
ardor for healthfulness, for righteousness and for patriotic 
endeavor which made one visibly aware in coming in con- 
tact with TheodoreRoosevelt that here was a great poten- 
tiality for the good of the world." 



CHAPTER III 

School and College 

DURING his days as a student, Roosevelt showed 
no unusual aptitude for any study except natural 
history. Speaking of his studies, he said himself, 
"In science and history and geography and in unexpected 
parts of German and French I was strong, but lamentably 
weak in Latin and Greek and mathematics." The 
interest in science and history and geography which this 
shows is borne out by the evidence of his later life, but 
there does not appear to have been such a strong inclina- 
tion towards any of these subjects as to have justified an 
observer, then, in prophesying any special kind of future 
for the boy. 

During his boyhood, his continual ill health kept him 
from regular attendance at school. For a few months he 
attended Professor McMullen's School on Twentieth 
Street, near his father's house, but most of the time he had 
tutors. One of these tutors, under whom he prepared to 
enter Harvard, was Mr. Arthur Cutler, who later founded 
the Cutler School in New York. The result of this absence 
of regular schooling was that the boy was left compara- 
tively free to develop his mind according to his own 
inclinations. With a strong interest in animals, it is not 
surprising that natural history captivated his attention 
at an early age. 

His career as a zoologist began when, one day, as a 
small boy, he was walking up Broadway past one of the 
city markets. Outside the market lay a dead seal on a 

(40) 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 41 

slab of wood. He had been reading about seals in Mayne 
Reid's books, and the sight of this one so close to him 
instantly filled him with a sense of romance and adventure 
which was increased when he learned that the animal had 
just been killed in New York Harbor. He became pos- 
sessed with a longing to own the seal. Being unable to 
form or execute any plan for satisfying that longing, he 
contented himself with visiting the market day by day to 
gaze upon the object which proved so interesting to him. 
He took the seal's measurements carefully with a folding 
pocket rule and had considerable difficulty when he came 
to measuring its girth. Somehow or other he got the 
animal's skull and with it he and two of his cousins im- 
mediately founded the Roosevelt Museum of Natural 
History. At the same time his observations of the seal 
and the measurements which he had made of it were care- 
fully set down in a blank book purchased for the purpose. 

In another blank book were recorded further observa- 
tions in natural history. This work was entitled, "Natural 
History on Insects, by Theodore Roosevelt, Jr.," and 
began in this fashion: "All these insects are native of 
North America. Most of the insects are not in other 
books. I will write about ants first." 

The beginning of the treatise on ants is entertaining, 
if not deeply scientific. "Ants," he writes, "are difided 
into three sorts for every species. These kinds are officer, 
soilder [soldier?] and work. There are about one officer 
to ten soilders and one soilder to two workers." The book 
then went on to describe other insects which he had 
observed, all of which he assured the reader "inhabit 
North America." At the end of the volume on insects 
were a few notes on fishes. Among these was a description 
of the crayfish. "I need not describe the form of the 



42 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

crayfish to you," wrote the author. "Look at the lobster 
and you have its form." These observations were 
recorded at the age of nine years, and are worth mention- 
ing because they show a real interest in the creatures of 
which he was writing. 

Roosevelt's father encouraged his study of natural 
history and, finding him absorbed in a book of Mayne 
Reid's on mammals, which was thrilling but not very 
accurate, presented the boy with a little book by J. G. 
Wood, the English naturalist, called "Homes without 
Hands." This was a real step towards the attainment of 
scientific knowledge. His father also, when he was about 
thirteen, sent him to take lessons in taxidermy from an 
old friend of Audubon's, named Bell, who kept a musty 
little shop which the pupil later likened to Mr. Venus' 
shop in "Our Mutual Friend." The study of taxidermy, 
of course, inspired the boy with a desire to procure his 
own specimens and his father consequently presented him 
with a gun for that purpose. 

When he first tried to use this gun, he was puzzled to 
find that he could not see the objects at which his com- 
panions were shooting. One day, some boys with him 
read aloud an advertisement written in huge letters on a 
bill-board some distance away, and Theodore then realized, 
for the first time, that there must be something the matter 
with his eyes, because he could not see the letters. His 
father soon got him a pair of spectacles which he says 
literally opened up a new world to him. 

When he was fourteen, he had become sufficiently 
interested in the study of natural history to get several 
new books on the subject, and to make a more careful 
study of it. In the winter of 1872 and 1873 the family 
visited the Old World for the second time, and, among 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 43 

other expeditions, took a trip up the Nile. Before they 
started on this trip he picked up in Cairo a book which 
contained some account of the birds of that region. 
Armed with this book, and with the gun which his father 
had given him, he secured a number of specimens of birds 
in Egypt, which, together with others procured later in 
Palestine, he subsequently presented to the Smithsonian 
Institution in Washington and to the American Museum 
of Natural History in New York. The fun of collecting 
was no doubt enhanced by the fact that before leaving 
home he and his two cousins, his fellow-directors of the 
Roosevelt Museum, had printed a set of museum labels 
in pink ink, expressly for use upon this expedition. 

Unfortunately for the rest of the family, Theodore 
insisted on carrying his natural history specimens about 
with him from place to place. One day when the family 
was in Vienna, his brother Elliot inquired plaintively of 
their father whether it would be possible that he should 
now and then have a room to hiinself in the hotels, instead 
of being obliged always to share one with Theodore. Mr. 
Roosevelt was perfectly willing to comply, but inquired 
the reason for Elliot's request. Elliot said, "Come and 
see our room, and you will understand." When they 
reached the boys' room, they found bottles of taxider- 
mist's supplies everywhere and in the basin the remains 
of specimens which Theodore had lately captured. 
Theodore himself records the fact that he was "grubby." 
"I suppose," he says, "that all growing boys tend to be 
grubby; but the ornithological small boy, or indeed the 
boy with the taste for natural history of any kind, is 
generally the very grubbiest of all." 

Some years before this expedition, his grandfather 
Roosevelt had made his summer home in Oyster Bay, on 



44 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Long Island Sound, and his father's two brothers had 
also regularly rented country places there during the 
summer. Upon their return from Europe, Theodore 
Roosevelt, Sr., also made Oyster Bay the summer home 
of his family. This gave the young naturalist increased 
opportunity for exploring trips and for observations. He 
did nothing which had any profound scientific significance, 
but he spent a great deal of time in what was to him an 
interesting, and profitable pursuit, and laid the founda- 
tion for a large part of the pleasure of his subsequent life. 

One more story of his boyhood should be related before 
leaving the subject of natural history. One of his sisters 
has told how, when he was a very small boy in petticoats 
with his hair in a curl on the top of his head, he dragged 
down from the book-shelf a huge volume describing David 
Livingstone's life in the heart of the Dark Continent, and 
held it on his lap. But this time it was not big game that 
little Theodore found. His sister said he struck something 
he did not understand. Clasping the big book in his short 
arms, he went from one to another to get light on a dark 
passage. After some effort he found a friend not too busy 
at the moment to listen to him. "What are * foraging' 
ants?" he asked. Of course no one in the family could 
give the required information off-hand. On investigation 
it was discovered that the baby naturalist had made a 
mistake in his reading. Livingstone had referred to *'the 
foregoing ants." It was not much easier to make a child 
in petticoats understand what "foregoing" ants might 
be. But that is the problem confronting older sisters in 
many a family where there is a small boy with an inquiring 
mind. 

Of reading young Theodore was very fond, although 
he did not show any marked sign of genius in the matter 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 45 

and manner of his reading. All of the children were 
devoted to the magazine called, "Our Young Folks," 
which the Colonel, years afterward, said he really believed 
he enjoyed going over then as much as when he was a 
small boy. This magazine taught him much more than 
any of his text-books, and everything in it instilled the 
individual virtues and the necessity of character as the 
chief factor in any man's success. He also has recorded 
his fondness for girls' stories, such as "Little Men," 
"Little Women," and "An Old-Fashioned Girl." 

After the trip up the Nile, in the winter of 1873, the 
younger children were left to spend the summer in 
Dresden in the house of Herr Minckwitz, an old gentleman 
who had taken part in the German revolution of 1848. 
To this experience Roosevelt looked back with delight in 
later years. The kindness of the family and the fascina- 
tion of the two sons, who were dueling students from the 
University of Leipzig, made a deep impression on him. 
One of the sons was known in dueling circles as the "Red 
Duke," and the other as "Sir Rhinoceros" because the 
tip of his nose had been cut off in a duel and sewn on again. 
During his visit in Germany Roosevelt acquired a fairly 
good speaking knowledge of German, and a real fondness 
for German poetry. The impression which he gained of 
German character and German family life was still strong 
upon him when he wrote of it forty years later. 

During all this time, until he was about fifteen years 
old, the boy was not strong. His asthma troubled him 
incessantly, deprived him of sleep, and made violent 
exercise difficult and sometimes impossible. During one 
of his attacks of asthma he was sent off by himself to 
Moosehead Lake, in Maine. On the stage-coach he met 
a couple of other boys of his own age, who were not 



46 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

troubled with ill health, and who were determined to 
annoy Theodore. He finally became so exasperated that 
he tried to fight his tormenters, only to discover that 
either one of them could easily handle him without even 
the necessity of hurting him. This was a considerable 
blow to his pride, and was the immediate cause which led 
to his taking boxing lessons from John Long, an ex-prize 
fighter, in New York. Long used to hold "championship 
matches" for the different weights in order to stimulate 
interest among his patrons, and young Roosevelt was 
fortunate enough to win in one of these contests, a pewter 
mug, which he cherished and boasted about for some 
years afterwards. 

About this time, also, he began to visit the Maine 
woods regularly every summer and sometimes in the 
winter. There he walked, paddled and hunted small 
game, partly from a love of the sport and of outdoors, 
and partly from an earnest determination to acquire 
health at the cost of no matter what effort. His com- 
panions in these excursions were two woodsmen named 
Bill Sewall and Bill Dow, between whom and Roosevelt 
there grew up a strong affection. Thirty years later 
Sewall, as collector of customs on the Aroostook border, 
served under his old companion, who had become President 
of the United States. 

Roosevelt went to Harvard in the fall of 1876 and 
became a member of the class of 1880. Among his class- 
mates were a goodly number of men who later rose to 
prominence, and some who became national figures. 
Among the latter were Albert Bushnell Hart, the historian ; 
Josiah Quincy, who became Assistant Secretary of State, 
and Robert Bacon, who later was Secretary of State and 
Ambassador to France. One of his closest friends in after 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 47 

life was Henry Cabot Lodge, then an instructor in history 
and now United States Senator from Massachusetts. 

The young collegian soon became a familiar figure 
in Cambridge and Boston — especially in Brookline — driv- 
ing about in a sort of sporting phaeton, then the height of 
the New York style in equipages. He had not yet taken 
up horseback riding as a regular exercise. Though he 
was especially fond of boxing and other vigorous sports, 
he astonished his student friends by skipping the rope. 
When he had explained that he engaged in this strange 
exercise because it strengthens the muscles of the legs 
and ankles, startled Cambridge saw college students skip- 
ping rope like school girls. 

His defective sight and his glasses were a handicap in 
boxing, baseball and kindred sports. But he boxed 
often — for the exercise and the physical discipline. He 
was still pale and thin, weighing only one hundred and 
thirty pounds. So he was rather dubious looking, even 
for a lightweight. His friends used to tell of an encounter 
he had, which especially illustrates his temper. He came 
into the ring with a huge pair of eyeglasses tied tight to 
his head. At the end of a lively round, time was called and 
Roosevelt quickly dropped his hands to his side. But his 
opponent dealt him a smashing blow between the eyes, 
covering the motionless lightweight's face with blood. 

"Foul! — foul!" cried the onlookers, and their angry 
protests showed that it might have gone hard with the 
other boxer. But Roosevelt rushed to the referee, 
shouting : 

"Stop stop!— He didn't hear!— He didn't hear!" 

On another occasion he entered the college lightweight 
boxing contest. After winning the preliminary round he 
was pitted against a master of the art named Hanks, who 



48 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

defeated him. "It was no fight at all," said one of the 
spectators afterward. "Hanks had the longer reach and 
was stronger, and Roosevelt was handicapped by his 
eyesight. I can see that little fellow yet, staggering about 
and banging into air. His opponent could not put him 
out and he would not give up. He showed his fighting 
qualities, but he never entered another bout." 

His closest associates at college were the members of 
the wealthy and cultured New York and Boston families. 
One of his classmates who has himself risen to a high place 
in his profession has told me that young Roosevelt was 
distinctly one of the "exclusive set;" that, though he 
was liked by most of those who came to know him, he 
had not at that time broken through the limitations 
of his birth. This means that his intense interest in the 
points of view of different classes and his ability to know 
and appreciate the best in a man, irrespective of his 
education or wordly condition, which became the 
marked and charming side of his character, was only fully 
developed after he left college and began to lay hold 
on life for himself. 

While he was at college Roosevelt taught a Sunday- 
school class at an Episcopal church, although he was not 
an Episcopalian He wrote of this later and added, "I do 
not think I made much of a success of it." One of the 
boys came to class one day with a black eye. The teacher 
was concerned at once. The lad explained that another 
boy had pinched his little sister and that he had acquired 
his black eye in an effort to resent the insult. This course 
of conduct met with the teacher's entire approval, which 
he signified by bestowing a dollar on the battle-scarred 
pupil. 

Later he was removed from his position of Sunday- 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 49 

school teacher by the rector of the church because he was 
not a confirmed member of the Episcopal Church. But he 
did not appear to cherish any grudge against the denomi- 
nation whose minister had thus summarily ousted him, 
for he turned up next week in an Episcopal Sunday-school 
in East Cambridge, and later taught in one at Chestnut 
Hill. 

What people sometimes describe as his thoughtless 
impulsiveness and disregard for appearances was illus- 
trated by another story of his college days. Late one 
rainy night four students who lived in the house with him 
heard a horse neighing frantically in a barn nearby. They 
dressed and went out in the dark to explore. When they 
reached the barn they found Roosevelt already there, 
half -clothed and minus his almost indispensable spectacles, 
struggling to release the horse's leg from a hole in the side 
of the stall. Perhaps closer observation will show that 
though Roosevelt certainly had little regard for conven- 
tional appearances, his supposed impulsiveness was due 
to his ability to think and act with unusual quickness in 
emergencies. 

It is of course interesting to see how early a distin- 
guished man has developed the tastes or characteristics 
which give him his distinction. If we should pursue this 
line of inquiry in Roosevelt's case we should get little 
information from his college career. A good deal of lati- 
tude was allowed the students in the matter of selecting 
their studies, although certain courses were prescribed for 
all. When it came to these electives, Roosevelt devoted 
one-half of them to natural history, but not a single one 
to history. In history and English literature he took only 
what was required of him and nothing more, and yet, in 
his later years, he was a writer of history and an eager 



50 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

reader of the best literature. He took no interest in 
elocution or in debating, although he became afterward a 
forceful and convincing public speaker. 

He joined, of course, with others in the conduct of 
such organizations as the Finance Club and the "0. K.," 
before whom papers were prepared and lectures delivered 
on economic and political questions. In the fall of 1880 
he was put in charge of the polls for the taking of a straw 
vote among the students during the campaign which cul- 
minated in the election of Garfield, and is said to have 
cast his own vote for Senator Bayard, a Democrat. Ac- 
cording to the Harvard Advocate, the undergraduate lit- 
erary paper of the period, "The gentleman in charge of 
the polls is a proof that the movement is not one of idle 
curiosity, but of earnest purpose/' 

The most ambitious work of his college life was the 
writing of "The Naval War of 1812." He began this in 
his senior year and published the work two years later. 
It was recognized as an authority on the subject, and 
brought from the British authors of the "History of the 
Royal Navy" a request that he should write for them the 
chapter of their work dealing with the War of 1812. 

During all this time he had become more and more 
deeply interested in Miss Alice Hathaway Lee, a young 
lady who lived in Chestnut Hill, which is a pleasant suburb 
of Boston. During his sophomore year he was a student 
in rhetoric under Professor Adams Sherman Hill. One 
day Hill was reading to his class a theme to which he ob- 
jected because it was over-romantic. In the middle of his 
reading he paused and suddenly asked Roosevelt to 
criticise the essay. The young man hesitated, and the 
professor then asked him specifically, "Mr. Roosevelt, 
what do you think of an undergraduate falling in love?" 



SCHOOL AND COLLEGE 51 

Roosevelt, blushing furiously, made no answer, and so his 
secret was out. The culmination of this affair was his 
engagement to Miss Lee and their marriage on his twenty- 
second birthday, a few months after he had graduated 
from college. 

He was graduated from the college department in the 
spring of 1880, having acquired a Phi Beta Kappa Key 
for proficiency in scholarship, a number of interesting 
friends and a determination to succeed. He said him- 
self: "I left college and entered the big world owing 
more than I can express to the training I had received, 
especially in my home, but with much else also to learn 
if I were to become fitted to do my part in the work that 
lay ahead for the generation of Americans to which I 
belonged." 

His sister, Mrs. Robinson, writes of him at this time : 
"His college life broadened every interest and did for 
him what had hitherto not been done, which was to give 
him confidence in his relationship with young men of his 
own age. Up to that time, owing to his delicacy of health, 
he had been somewhat of a recluse, from the standpoint 
of relationship of boy to boy." 



CHAPTER IV 

The First Plunge into Politics 

THEODORE ROOSEVELT'S father died the 9th 
of February, 1878, while his son was a sophomore 
at Harvard. The loss of such a father, especially 
at a period of his life when he needed hirn most, was in a 
sense irreparable. It was his first great sorrow. It also 
modified the immediate course of his life, throwing on 
him the responsibilities of a man. 

The father and son had often talked over the boy's 
future course in life. The younger Theodore had been 
brought up with the distinct idea that he was expected to 
work. His father, though he had inherited a consider- 
able fortune, had worked hard all his life, and he expected 
his son to do likewise. On entering college, the son's 
ambition had been to devote his life to natural history. 
His father had told him that he could do so, provided he 
took up scientific work in a serious manner, but that if 
he was not going to earn money, he must "even things 
up by not spending it." If he was to be a scientist, his 
fortune would not be sufficient to do more than live quietly 
and comfortably. 

He would probably have persisted in a scientific career, 
at least for some time after leaving college, had it not been 
that the course of instruction at Harvard, as in all Amer- 
ican colleges at that time, discouraged any work that was 
not done in a laboratory. Instead of encouraging his 
taste for field work, they treated biology as purely a 
"closet" science, and required him to spend his time in 
the study of minute forms of marine life or else in section- 

(52) 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 53 

cutting and the study of the tissues of the higher organisms 
under the microscope. He tells us that he had no more 
desire or ability to to be a microscopist and section-cutter 
than he had to be a mathematician. If he had to work 
with these things to be a scientist, then he would have to 
choose some other path in life. 

After his marriage, on October 27, 1880, he went to 
Europe. While in Switzerland he climbed the Jungfrau 
and the Matterhorn, sufficiently rare feats for those days 
to enable him to qualify as a member of the Alpine Club. 
On his return he and his wife took up their residence in 
New York and the young college graduate began to study 
law. His legal studies, however, did not last long. He 
believed himself that had he come in contact with some 
great professor of law, like the late Professor Thayer of 
the Harvard Law School, who had an understanding of 
social conditions as well as technical legal knowledge, he 
might have continued and become a member of the Bar. 
I doubt, however, whether he would ever have been a good 
lawyer, in spite of his ability to follow and grasp a legal 
argument, and I am quite sure that he was temperament- 
ally unfitted to be happy performing the ordinary services 
of the lawyer. As it was, it did not seem to him that the 
law was framed to discourage, as it should, sharp practice, 
and all other kinds of bargains except those which were 
fair and of benefit to both sides. "I was young," he 
tells us. "There was much in the judgment which I 
then formed on this matter which I should now revise; 
but, then as now, many of the big corporation lawyers, to 
whom the ordinary members of the Bar then, as now, 
looked up, held certain standards which were difficult to 
recognize as compatible with the idealism I suppose every 
high-minded young man is apt to feel." 



54 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

If he had been obliged to earn his living, though, he 
would probably not have continued in the study of law; 
he would have devoted all his energies to making both 
ends meet, for he always held the belief, "that a man's 
first duty is to pull his own string and to take care of those 
dependent upon him.' ' But his father had left him enough 
money to make it unnecessary for him to earn the neces- 
saries of life, and so, in abandoning the study of law he 
became absorbed in politics, and in the work necessary 
to complete his "History of the American Navy in the 
War of 1812." 

As stated, he graduated from college in 1880, and 
spent most of the first year thereafter abroad; and 
yet, in the fall of 1881, he was elected as a member of 
the Assembly, or lower House of the New York Legis- 
lature, the youngest member of that body. Re-elected at 
the end of the first year, and still the youngest man in the 
Legislature, he became the nominee of the minority, or 
Republican, party for speaker. Re-elected again for a 
third term, in the fall of 1883, though defeated for the 
speakership, he became floor leader. This is a remarkable 
record. I do not know that the records of any of our states 
show an equally rapid rise to prominence of a young man 
between twenty-three and twenty-six years of age. 

His election to the Assembly and his success as a 
member were due not so much to his ability, though of 
course without ability he could have accomplished little, 
as to traits of character and points of view. On gradua- 
tion from college he made up his mind that he would 
take an interest in politics, and when he settled in New 
York he at once proceeded to put the resolution in effect 
by making inquiries as to the whereabouts of the local 
Republican Association, and the means of joining it. The 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 55 

fact that the persons of his own social set who lived near 
him laughed at him and told him that politics were low, 
and that the organization was controlled not by gentle- 
men but by saloon-keepers, horse-car conductors and the 
like did not deter him in the least. He expressed his atti- 
tude of mind to a protesting relative, "If the people who 
run these organizations, whoever they are, are the govern- 
ing class, then I propose to be one of the governing class.' ' 

Neither the resolution to become a member of the Dis- 
trict Association of his party, nor membership, itself would 
have gotten him into politics, had it not been for the 
fact that, unlike many persons of his birth and education, 
it never occurred to him that he was going into politics to 
obtain reform for the community, as if reform was a con- 
crete substance like a cake; neither did it occur to him 
that he was joining the organization for the purpose of 
doing good to a collection of ignorant and benighted per- 
sons. Not that he had not ideals — he had ideals; but 
he joined the District Association of his party because 
he wanted to get into the game, and exercise what he 
regarded as the right of every American, the right to 
take part, though it may be but a small and humble part, 
in governing the country. The District Association met 
in Morton Hall, a large, barnlike room over a saloon. 
Roosevelt came to the meeting just as the other members 
came, because he wanted to come, and not with any pat- 
ronizing ideas of doing good. Being a hearty, likable 
fellow, they soon began to like and respect him. 

The relationship I have described being once estab- 
lished, his birth, his education, his refinement, told polit- 
ically in his favor not against him. Every rich and 
"carefully" brought up young man in America who now 
may be wondering how he can get into politics can have 



56 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the same experience, if he has young Roosevelt's point 
of view toward the politicians, saloon-keepers and hangers- 
on at Morton Hall, in the Twenty-first Assembly District 
of New York. 

For the reasons just expressed, his opportunity for 
election to public office would have come eventually; but 
it probably would not have come as quickly as it did had it 
not been for the circumstance that one Joseph Murray, 
the local political leader, determined to defeat the candi- 
date selected by the then political boss of the district, Jake 
Hess. Murray picked Roosevelt as a fellow candidate. 
He picked him because he believed that with Roosevelt 
he was most likely to win. He did win, and Roosevelt was 
nominated. Jake Hess had no hard feeling, and Joe and 
Jake started in to elect the nominee. Their first idea was 
to take the candidate through the saloons in the district. 
The first saloon-keeper visited assumed the attitude of 
dictating to the candidate, with the object of pledging his 
vote for a reduction of the amount of the liquor license. 
Roosevelt flatly told the man that he believed the charge 
for the license should be increased, and a hot altercation 
was about to take place when his two mentors on some 
excuse, grabbed the young candidate and took him out 
into the street. After that, they recommended him to 
seek votes on Fifth Avenue, and they would attend to the 
election on Sixth Avenue, the saloon quarter. This 
arrangement worked out satisfactorily and the candi- 
date was triumphantly elected. 

In the Legislature he found those conditions which 
were typical of conditions in most of our state legisla- 
tures at the time, and which with some modifications may 
be found today. The majority of the members were per- 
sonally honest, though many of them allowed their per- 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 57 

sonal judgment to be controlled by the local boss, to whom 
they owed their election. There were a few men of high 
purpose, courage and capacity for self-sacrifice, and, on 
the other hand, there were what was known as the 
Black Horse Cavalry, the men who were thoroughly 
corrupt, and who largely looked upon their position 
in the Legislature as an opportunity to secure money 
from corporations interested in passing or defeating bills. 
Roosevelt's associates in the Legislature were Isaac 
Hunt, Jonas van Duzer, Walter Howe and Henry Sprague, 
whom he regarded as his closest friends and allies, as well, 
as "a gigantic one-eyed veteran of the Civil War, a gallant 
general, Curtis, from St. Lawrence County," and also, 
among the Democrats, Hampden Robb, Thomas Newbold 
and Tom Welch of Niagara, as well as a couple of members 
from New York and Brooklyn, Mike Costello and Pete 
Kelly. With the aid of some or all of these men, he suc- 
ceeded in securing the enactment of a Civil Service Law. 
He secured an investigation of the county offices of the 
state, by which it was discovered that the principal offi- 
cials in New York County "were drawing nearly a million 
dollars a year in fees, while discharging no duties what- 
ever;" he instituted an inquiry into the abuse of police 
powers and secured an amendment to the constitution of 
the state taking from the aldermen of New York City the 
executive power and placing it in the hands of the mayor. 
The last was a most important reform recommended by 
a committee of which he was chairman, appointed to look 
into various phases of New York City official life. As 
chairman, Roosevelt's energy and fearlessness enabled him 
to expose many of the corrupt practices then existing, thus 
arousing public sentiment in favor of concentrating power 
and responsibility in the mayor. At the time the mayor's 



58 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

appointments had to be confirmed by the alderman. The 
bill recommended by the committee took away this power. 
Roosevelt, throughout his life, always believed in the 
policy of this measure. He believed that the people should 
elect a few officials and hold them responsible; that it is 
impossible to get citizens interested in the character and 
ability of subordinate officials and that, therefore, subor- 
dinate officials should be appointed, not elected. Of the 
particular measure recommended by his committee, he 
said, "Taking away the confirming power of the board of 
aldermen would not give the citizens of New York good 
government. We knew that if they chose to elect the 
wrong kind of mayor they would have bad government, 
no matter what the form of law was. But we did secure 
to them the chance to get good government if they 
desired, and this was impossible as long as the old system 
remained.' ' 

The important result of his three years' experience in 
the Legislature, however, was not so much the legislation 
he succeeded in having adopted, but the results of his 
experiences on himself. He learned the invaluable lesson 
that in important activities of life no man can render the 
highest service unless he can act in combination with his 
fellows, which means a certain amount of "give and take." 
In other words, he passed through the phase of complete 
independence, that is, the acting on each case as he per- 
sonally viewed it, without paying any heed to the prin- 
ciples and prejudices of others. The resulting loss of any 
power of accomplishing anything at all soon taught him 
his mistake. Again, he learned the equally valuable les- 
son, that the man in public life loses the power to accom- 
plish any good at all if he falls into the habit of looking 
ahead to ascertain the effect of his present action on his 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 59 

future political career. He tells us that at one period he 
began to believe that he had a future, and that it behooved 
him to be very farsighted and "scan each action carefully 
with a view to its possible effect on that future.' ' 'This," 
he adds, "speedily made me useless to the public and an 
object of aversion to myself." 

It is probable that, like most young men, he had gone 
to the Assembly believing that all the reputable men he 
knew, friends of his father and his family, really believed 
in good government, and were opposed to corruption in 
politics. His awakening to the knowledge that this 
assumption was false was as much of a shock to him as it 
usually is to other young men when they first realize the 
connection of some of their respected seniors with the rami- 
fications of crooked business and crooked politics. He 
made an attempt to impeach a certain judge. The judge 
had been used by some men connected with some great 
corporations of the time. Though there was considerable 
evidence against the judge, who had gone so far as to write 
a letter to a prominent financier in which he expressed 
himself as "willing to go to the very verge of judicial dis- 
cretion to serve your vast interests,' ' it was impossible to 
secure his impeachment. During the investigation, Roose- 
velt was taken out to lunch by an old family friend who 
he asserts had a genuine personal liking for him. We will 
let Colonel Roosevelt himself tell the rest of the story: 

"He explained that I had done well in the Legislature, 
that it was a good thing to have made the 'reform play,' 
that I had shown that I possessed ability such as would 
make me useful in the right kind of law office or business 
concern; but that I must not overplay my hand; that I 
had gone far enough, and that now was the time to leave 
politics and identify myself with the right kind of people, 



60 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the people who would always in the long run control others 
and obtain the real rewards which were worth having. 
I asked him if that meant I was to yield to the ring in poli- 
tics. He answered somewhat impatiently that I was 
entirely mistaken (as in fact I was) about there being 
merely a political ring of the kind of which the papers were 
fond of talking; that the 'ring/ if it could be called such, 
that is, the inner circle, included certain big business men, 
and the politicians, lawyers and judges who were in alli- 
ance with, and, to a certain extent, dependent upon them, 
and that the successful man had to win his success by the 
backing of the same forces, whether in law, business or 
politics.' ' 

It is needless to remark that the old family friend did 
not attain the object which he sought in inviting young 
Roosevelt to take lunch with him. 

There were other experiences which made lasting 
impressions that were useful to him. Once certain large 
corporate influences came to him to ask him to take 
charge of a bill granting them certain terminal facilities 
in New York City. They told him quite frankly that the 
bill was one which exposed them to the demands of venal 
politicians because it would grant a valuable privilege. 
He looked into the subject and came to the conclusion 
that the legislation was proper and beneficial to the citi- 
zens of New York, and consented to take charge of the 
bill, provided they would not use any corrupt means to 
secure its passage. He was chairman of the committee to 
which the bill was referred. He was convinced that the 
majority of the committee were corrupt. Before a meet- 
ing of the committee in which he intended to bring up the 
bill, he noticed that a chair in the committee room was 
broken. In case of trouble, he secured one of the legs and 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 61 

placed it where he could easily reach it. He then called 
the meeting to order. He made a motion to report the 
bill favorably. This was voted down. He then made a 
motion to have the bill reported unfavorably. Again the 
members of the Black Horse Cavalry present voted against 
the measure and the motion was defeated. This meant 
that the majority of the committee would try to smother 
the bill by refusing to vote it out of the committee until 
the corporation paid them their price. Taking the bill, 
he put it in his pocket, arose and told the members that 
he would report it. The members of the Black Horse Cav- 
alry saw the prospect of illicit gain disappearing. Threat- 
ening murmurs arose on all sides, but he walked out of the 
room with the bill unmolested; the convenient chair-leg 
firmly clasped in his hand probably had a quieting effect. 
However, though he could report the bill, he could not get 
it through. The representatives of the corporation told 
him that perhaps a person of more experience might suc- 
ceed. The bill was placed in charge of a "more experienced 
politician" and not long afterwards it was adopted, his 
enemies of the Black Horse Cavalry all voting for it. 

The chair-leg just referred to probably had the desired 
effect on the members of his committee because they 
knew that the slight young man was probably the best 
boxer in the House. Of this they had had tangible proof. 
Once a group of the members decided that this young 
man from the most fashionable district of New York would 
be improved and give less trouble in the future if he re- 
ceived a good beating. They therefore hired a person 
named "Stubby" Collins, of some repute as a slugger, to 
take the first opportunity "to do him up. " The collision 
occurred in the old Delavan House, a hotel where the 
members of the Assembly used to congregate in the eve- 



62 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

ning. As Roosevelt was leaving, he passed the door lead- 
ing to the buffet. A noisy crowd came out. "Stubby," 
who was one of their number ran into him and then struck 
at him, angrily demanding why Roosevelt had run into 
him. The blow never reached its mark, but it is recorded 
that "Stubby" was, in a few moments, a fit subject for the 
anxious care of his friends. Thereafter no one attempted 
to reform young Roosevelt's conduct by administering 
to him physical chastisement. 

One measure which came before the Assembly while 
he was a member, and when Cleveland was Governor, 
gave him an opportunity to display the kind of moral 
courage of which I spoke in the introductory chapter. 
A bill was passed reducing the fare on the elevated roads 
in New York City from ten cents to five cents. The bill 
was immensely popular. The corporation running the 
elevated railway was deservedly unpopular. Roosevelt 
had voted for the bill. Cleveland vetoed the measure on 
the ground of its unconstitutionality, because it violated 
the implied contract on the strength of which the stock- 
holders had subscribed their money to build the roads. 
Everyone expected that Roosevelt would lead the fight 
to pass the bill over the Governor's veto. Instead of doing 
this, he voted to sustain the Governor, and frankly apolo- 
gized for his previous vote in favor of the measure. 

"I have to say with shame that when I voted for this 
bill I did not act as I think I ought to have acted on the 
floor of this House. For the only time, I did at that time 
vote contrary to what I think to be honestly right. I have 
to confess that I weakly yielded, partly to a vindictive 
feeling toward the infernal thieves who have those rail- 
roads in charge and partly to the popular voice in New 
York. For the managers of the elevated railroads I have 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 63 

as little feeling as any man here, and if it were possible I 
should be willing to pass a bill of attainder against Gould 
and all of his associates. I realize that they have done the 
most incalculable harm in this community, with their 
hired stock-jobbing newspaper, with their corruption of 
the judiciary, and with their corruption of this House. 
It is not a question of doing right to them, for they are 
merely common thieves. As to the resolution" — a peti- 
tion handed in by the directors of the company — "signed 
by Gould and his son, I would pay more attention to a 
petition signed by Barney Aaron, Owney Geoghegan, and 
Billy McGlory then I would pay to that paper, because I 
regard these men as part of an infinitely dangerous order — 
the wealthy criminal class." 

Many expected that he had written his political death 
warrant. His action would have had this effect if his whole 
course at Albany had not shown that he was above the 
suspicion of being subject directly or indirectly to corpo- 
rate influences. As it was, whether they agreed with him 
or not, the courage which it took to make the speech 
strengthened him, not only with his constituents but with 
hundreds of others. 

Then, as now, a representative who wished really to 
protect the interests of his constituents was on the look- 
out for snake bills, that is bills which, as originally intro- 
duced, have a most innocent appearance, but which are 
amended at the last moment to further some special inter- 
est willing to take advantage of any means, however low, 
to promote legislation from which they expect financial 
benefit. It was in connection with one of these bills that 
an exciting scene took place in the House, and in which 
Roosevelt was a center of interest. Roosevelt and Mike 
Costello used to spend a good deal of time examining the 



64 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

different bills introduced. One bill puzzled them. It 
proposed a constitutional amendment, harmless enough 
in character. The puzzling thing about it was not the bill, 
but the author, a saloon-keeper. Why should that par- 
ticular saloon-keeper take an interest in an amendment 
to the constitution? He belonged distinctly to that class 
of representatives who could refer to constitutional amend- 
ments as "local legislation," though history does not tell us 
if he was the same man who indignantly replied to Roose- 
velt's objection that his pet bill was unconstitutional — 
"What is the constitution between friends?" 

The bill was introduced and passed the House. It 
then went over to the Senate, where, just before its final 
passage, it was amended, by the simple process of striking 
out everything except the enacting clause, and by in- 
serting an entirely new bill to remit the unpaid taxes 
due by the elevated roads of New York City. By 
mere chance, Mike Costello heard the amendment 
read in the Senate. The bill had to be returned to the 
House for concurrence in the amendment. Those in charge 
of the measure waited until both Roosevelt and Costello 
were away, and then started to rush the bill through. 
Costello, in an anteroom, heard what was going on, rushed 
in and at once started a filibuster, at the same time send- 
ing for his young associate. Roosevelt thus described 
the scene that followed : 

"The speaker pro tern, called him to order. Mike con- 
tinued to speak and protest; the speaker hammered him 
down; Mike continued his protests; the sergeant-at-arms 
was sent to arrest and remove him; and then I bounced 
in, and continued the protest, and refused to sit down or 
be silent. Amid wild confusion the amendment was de- 
clared adopted, and the bill was ordered engrossed and 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 65 

sent to the Governor. But we had carried our point. The 
next morning the whole press rang with what had happen- 
ed; every detail of the bill, and every detail of the way it 
had been slipped through the Legislature, were made 
public. All the slow and cautious men in the House, who 
had been afraid of taking sides, now came forward in sup- 
port of us. Another debate was held on the proposal to 
rescind the vote; the city authorities waked up to pro- 
test; the Governor refused to sign the bill. Two or three 
years later, after much litigation, the taxes were paid; in 
the newspapers it was stated that the amount was over 
$1,500,000. It was Mike Costello, to whom primarily 
was due the fact that this sum was saved the public, and 
that the forces of corruption received a stinging rebuff. 
He did not expect recognition or reward for his services; 
and he got none. The public, if it knew of what he had 
done, promptly forgot it. The machine did not forget it, 
and turned him down at the next election.' ' 

Throughout his course in the Legislature his primary 
interest was in reform as then understood; that is, in 
improving the methods of appointment to executive office, 
in defeating corrupt legislation and in antagonizing low 
political methods, as well as in improving, in details, the 
machinery of government. The larger questions of social 
and industrial justice and the need for a fundamental 
change in the citizen's individualistic outlook on life- 
questions which were to absorb so large a part of his energy 
during his career as President and afterwards, were not 
really considered by him, though he did have one useful 
experience in connection with an attempt to improve 
tenement-house conditions, an experience which made a 
lasting impression on him, and to which we will have 
occasion to refer later. 



66 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

It was natural that in the campaign for the Republi- 
can nomination, in the spring of 1884, he should be found 
with those in favor of the nomination of Senator George 
F. Edmunds, of Vermont. Edmunds was a man whose 
whole course in the Senate had justly won for him the 
admiration of men whose political interests and ideals were 
those of the young assemblyman. Together with a group 
of men from New York, Roosevelt went to the con- 
vention in the interests of the Vermont Senator. His 
position among his fellow-delegates from the state is 
evidenced by the fact that he was made their represen- 
tative on the Resolutions, or Platform, Committee. Prac- 
tically from the opening of the convention, he realized, 
what some of his older associates did not realize, that the 
nomination of "the man from Maine," James G. Blaine, 
was inevitable, not only because he was by far the strong- 
est candidate with the rank and file of the delegates, but 
because John A. Logan, himself a candidate, would prob- 
ably allow his strength to go to the "plumed knight,'' as 
Col. Robert G. Ingersoll called Blaine in his nomination 
speech. His belief in the ultimate result, however, did not 
interfere with his working hard to effect a combination 
with the forces of President Arthur to prevent Blaine's 
nomination. Blaine, however, was the real choice of the 
majority of the party. He was selected on the fourth 
ballot by a vote of 541 out of a total of 813. 

To Roosevelt, as to thousands of other Republicans, 
the nomination of Blaine presented a serious question. 
At the time, while Blaine was decidedly popular with 
those who had come in contact with his magnetic person- 
ality, his nomination was generally regarded as the 
triumph of policies to which the reform element of the 
party were generally opposed. Roosevelt had voted 



THE FIRST PLUNGE INTO POLITICS 67 

against the resolution introduced prior to the balloting 
which bound the delegates to support the nominee of the 
convention. Thousands of Republicans on the nomina- 
tion of Mr. Cleveland decided to desert the Republican 
party and vote for the man whose course as Governor of 
New York had shown him a friend of Civil Service Reform, 
and a strong opponent of corruption in politics. Roose- 
velt remained Republican. He supported Blaine. Look- 
ing back now at this distance of time, it is not difficult to 
perceive that his decision was right. Not that those who 
at that period deserted the Republican party were neces- 
sarily wrong. Parties are but instruments through which 
men work to obtain ends. It was true of Roosevelt as it 
was probably not true of the majority of those who 
deserted the Republican party in the fall of 1884, that for 
him a greater opportunity for effective good lay within 
the Republican party than without it. Had he made the 
mistake of becoming what was known in the political 
parlance of the day as a "mugwump," his opportunity for 
the kind of service which he was capable of rendering 
would have been narrowed. 



CHAPTER V 

i 

The Elkhorn Ranch 

IN September, 1883, Roosevelt went to what was 
then the Territory of Dakota and bought a ranch 
known as the "Chimney Butte," on the Little Mis- 
souri. In June of the following year he purchased the 
Elkhorn Ranch lower down the river. Thereafter, and 
until his acceptance of the appointment as Civil Service 
Commissioner in 1889, he was engaged actively in the 
business of a rancher. Though he still spent the greater 
part of each winter in New York, he lived during the 
major portion of these years at one or other of his ranches. 

"It was still the Wild West in those days,' ' he tells us, 
"the Far West, the West of Owen Wister's stories and 
Frederic Remington's drawings, the West of the Indian 
and the buffalo-hunter, the soldier and the cow-puncher. 
That land of the West has gone now, 'gone, gone with lost 
Atlantis,' gone to the isle of ghosts and of strange dead 
memories. It was a land of vast silent spaces, of lonely 
rivers, and of plains where the wild game stared at the 
passing horseman. It was a land of scattered ranches, of 
herds of long-horned cattle, and of reckless riders who 
unmoved looked in the eyes of life or of death." 

His determination not to seek re-election to the As- 
sembly in the fall of 1884, and to take up seriously the 
business of a ranchman on the Western plains was prob- 
ably due to a combination of causes. As we have seen, 
the nomination of Blaine, while it did not drive him out 
of the Republican party, as it did many of his associates, 

(68) 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 69 

nevertheless left him out of sympathy with the then 
dominant elements of the party in national affairs. Again 
while he had intensely enjoyed his life at Albany and the 
game of politics, politics were not his only interest. He 
was always ambitious to become distinguished as a writer, 
and ranch life, while rough, with periods of arduous phys- 
ical work, nevertheless left for a man of his temperament 
much leisure for writing. 

There were also intimate personal reasons. On Feb- 
ruary 14, 1884, he lost both his wife and his mother, 
his wife dying two days after the birth of a daughter. 
This double loss severed the ties which would otherwise 
probably have prevented his taking up the life of a 
ranchman. His mind naturally sought relief in solitude 
rather than in the contests and excitements of politics at 
Albany. Besides these immediate and perhaps deter- 
mining causes, he loved the Western life. 

"I do not believe," he says, "there was any life more 
attractive to a vigorous young fellow than life on a cattle 
ranch in those days. It was a fine, healthy life too; it 
taught a man self-reliance, hardihood and the value of 
instant decision — in short, the virtues that ought to come 
from life in the open country. I enjoyed the life to the 
full." 

The rugged experiences of the outlying places of the 
world appealed to him. To borrow from Kipling, he 
heard the "Red Gods" calling, and looked beyond the 
skyline where the strange roads go down. 

At first the Chimney Butte ranch house was a one- 
room log structure with a dirt roof, a corral for the horses 
nearby, and a chicken-house jabbed against the rear of 
the ranch house. Later he brought out to the Elkhorn 
Ranch his old friends from Maine, Sewall and Dow. They 



70 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

were mighty with the axe and built for him a long low 
ranch house of hewn logs, with bed-rooms, and a sitting- 
room with a big fireplace. Here it was that he gathered 
about him the books he loved, Van Dyke's " Still Hunter/ ' 
Dodge's "Plains of the Great West," Caton's "Deer and 
Antelope of America" and Coues' "Birds of the North- 
west." "As for Irving, Hawthorne, Cooper, Lowell and 
the other standbys," he writes, "I suppose no man, either 
East or West, would willingly be long without them." 
For lighter reading he had "dreamy Ik Marvel, Burroughs' 
breezy pages, and the quaint, pathetic character sketches 
of the Southern writers, Cable, Craddock, Macon, Joel 
Chandler Harris and sweet Sherwood Bonner." He prob- 
ably had Poe's tales and poems, for when he was in the 
Bad Lands he felt " as if they somehow looked just exactly 
as Poe's tales and poems sound.' ' 

He wrote books as well as read them — books on history, 
politics, and phases of his Western life. His "Hunting 
Trips of a Ranchman" appeared in 1886, and his "Life of 
Thomas Hart Benton " in 1887. The " Life of Gouverneur 
Morris," "Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail," and "Es- 
says in Practical Politics," which had first appeared as 
magazine articles, were published in 1888. It was here 
he received the inspiration for his four-volume work, 
"The Winning of the West," for his own experiences 
were attended with pioneer perils which put him in keenest 
sympathy with the experiences of Lewis and Clark less 
than a century before. He often expressed his regard for 
honest, courageous manhood, whether he found it in a 
cowpuncher, an Indian, or even in one of those Western 
desperadoes popularly known as a "bad man," if he 
betrayed generous impulses and was willing to improve 
and live squarely. In "The Strenuous Life" he wrote: 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 71 

"Thank God for the iron in the blood of our fathers, 
the men who upheld the wisdom of Lincoln, and bore the 
sword in the army of Grant !' ' 

There was work on the ranch in plenty, and hard work, 
too, often full of danger, and sometimes privation. He 
knew what it was to ride under the scorching midsummer 
sun or in the freezing cold of the late fall round-up. He 
knew the biting wind of the winter blizzard, the monotony 
of guarding hour after hour the trail cattle or the beef 
herds at the slowest of walks, and the "minutes or hours 
teeming with excitement" when the herd stampeded, or 
when they had to be guided across ice-filled rivers or rivers 
full of dangerous quicksands. 

He had several experiences trying to ride bucking 
bronchos. One threw him off on a rock during a round-up 
and broke his arm, and another horse, known as "the 
Devil," fell backwards upon him and split the point of 
his shoulder. On both occasions there was nothing to do 
but remount and go on with the work of rounding up, for 
often the nearest doctor was more than one hundred miles 
away. 

He tells us that he never became a good rider accord- 
ing to Western standards. Yet he was, and remained 
all his life, according to Eastern standards, an excellent 
horseman. 

Though he could handle a rope, he could not always 
handle it with dexterity. Once he and George Meyer, who 
long afterwards, like many of his companions in those 
days, was a delegate to the First Progressive National 
Convention, were trying to get some cattle across a river. 
Two of the calves refused to budge. Meyer's calf was 
small, and he could carry it in his arms while he rode his 
horse, but Roosevelt's calf was too big for this process. 



72 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

So Roosevelt roped it, and attempted to pull it along. 
Owing to some lack of dexterity with the rope, the calf, 
bouncing and bleating, swung around the rear of the 
horse, bringing the rope under his tail. There was a bank 
four feet high on either side of the river. The horse bolted 
and went over the bank and into the water with a splash. 
The calf followed, described a parabola in the air, and 
landed "plunk" beside the horse. The calf could not buck 
in the stream, so across, horse, rider and calf went, the calf 
"making a wake like Pharaoh's army at the Red Sea." 

There were spring and early summer round-ups to 
brand the calves, and fall round-ups to collect the cattle 
for the winter. They were attended by all the cowboys 
for miles around, and there was lots of hard, exciting work 
and plenty of fun. He has left us a description of one 
of those comparatively rare occasions when the cattle 
stampeded : 

"One night there was a heavy storm, and all of us who 
were at the wagons were obliged to turn out hastily to 
help the night herders. After a while there was a terrific 
peal of thunder, the lightning struck right by the herd, 
and away all the beasts went, heads and horns and tails 
in the air. For a minute or two I could make out nothing 
except the dark forms of the beasts running on every side 
of me, and I should have been very sorry if my horse had 
stumbled, for those behind would have trodden me down. 
Then the herd split, part going to one side, while the other 
part seemingly kept straight ahead, and I galloped as hard 
as ever beside them. I was trying to reach the point — 
the leading animals — in order to turn them, when suddenly 
there was a tremendous splashing in front. I could dimly 
make out that the cattle immediately ahead and to one 
side of me were disappearing, and the next moment the 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 73 

horse and I went off a cut bank into the Little Missouri. 
I bent away back in the saddle, and though the horse 
almost went down he just recovered himself, and, plunging 
and struggling through water and quicksand, we made the 
other side. Here I discovered that there was another 
cowboy with the same part of the herd that I was with; 
but almost immediately we separated. I galloped hard 
through a bottom covered with big cottonwood trees, and 
stopped the part of the herd that I was with, but very soon 
they broke on me again, and repeated this twice. Finally 
toward morning the few I had left came to a halt. 

"It had been raining hard for some time. I got off my 
horse and leaned against a tree, but before long the infernal 
cattle started on again, and I had to ride after them. 
Dawn came soon after this, and I was able to make out 
where I was and head the cattle back, collecting other 
little bunches as I went. After a while I came on a cow- 
boy on foot carrying his saddle on his head. He was my 
companion of the previous night. His horse had gone full 
speed into a tree and killed itself, the man, however, not 
being hurt. I could not help him, as I had all I could do 
to handle the cattle. When I got them to the wagon, most 
of the other men had already come in and the riders were 
just starting on the long circle. One of the men changed 
my horse for me while I ate a hasty breakfast, and then 
we were off for the day's work. 

"As only about half of the night herd had been brought 
back, the circle riding was particularly heavy, and it was 
ten hours before we were back at the wagon. We then 
changed horses again and worked the whole herd until 
after sunset, finishing just as it grew too dark to do any- 
thing more. By this time I had been nearly forty hours in 
the saddle, changing horses five times, and my clothes had 



74 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

thoroughly dried on me, and I fell asleep as soon as I 
touched the bedding. Fortunately some men who had 
gotten in late in the morning had had their sleep during 
the daytime, so that the rest of us escaped night guard 
and were not called until four next morning. Nobody ever 
gets enough sleep on a round-up.' ' 

At first he had to overcome not only the prejudice 
against all tenderfeet but the special prejudice which 
was attached to him on account of his eye-glasses. The 
cowboys called him "Four Eyes." He said it always 
took him at least twenty -four hours in a new place to 
live down this prejudice. Speaking of meeting a strange 
set of men at a round-up, he adds, "By this time I would 
have been accepted as one of the outfit, and all strange- 
ness would have passed off, the attitude of my fellow cow- 
punchers being one of friendly forgiveness, even towards 
my spectacles." 

Once a rowdy in a tavern where Roosevelt was to stay 
all night noticed this queer tenderfoot and, desiring to 
have some real fun yelled, "Look what's drifted in! 
Step up, boys, and take a look at Four Eyes!" 

The wearer of the offending glasses paying no atten- 
tion, the loafer, emboldened, pointed a pair of cocked pis- 
tols at him and informed the crowd that " Mr. Four-Eyes' ' 
would treat everyone to a drink. Roosevelt started to- 
wards the bar as if to comply, but, catching the bad 
man off his guard, landed a few blows under the man's 
chin and elsewhere. As he went over backwards his pistols 
went off, making holes in the ceiling, and he struck his 
head with such force against the edge of the bar that he 
failed to come to until some time after he had been car- 
ried out to a neighboring shed and Roosevelt had gone to 
bed. When he did come to, not liking to face the jeers of 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 75 

the bystanders after such a beating, he drifted down to 
the station and disappeared from the place on the first 
passing freight train. "Mr. Four-Eyes" had proved to 
be the liveliest tenderfoot that that bad man had ever met. 
The story of another personal encounter of quite a 
different kind with a certain Frenchman of rank, known 
as the Marquis de Mores, is told by the late Jacob Riis. 
This marquis was one of the first settlers thereabout. He 
built Medora, the county seat, and named it for his wife. 
He was determined to rule in the region, and he had tried 
to do this by intimidating all comers. "Whether it was 
over a cattle matter," says Riis, or "some other local con- 
cern that his misunderstanding with the Marquis de Mores 
arose, of which there have been so many versions, I have 
forgotten. It does not matter. In the nature of things it 
had to come sooner or later, on one pretext or another. 
The two were neighbors, their ranches being some ten or 
fifteen miles apart. The marquis was a gallant but exag- 
gerated Frenchman, with odd feudal notions still clinging 
in his brain. He took it into his head to be offended by 
something Roosevelt was reported to have said, before he 
had met him, and wrote him a curt note telling him what 
he had heard, and that 'there was a way for gentlemen to 
settle their differences,' to which he invited Roosevelt's 
attention. Mr. Roosevelt promptly replied that he had 
heard a lie; that he, the marquis, had no business to be- 
lieve it true upon such evidence, and that he would follow 
his note in person within the hour. He despatched the 
letter to Medora, where the marquis was, by one of his 
men, and, true to his word, started himself immediately 
after. Before he came in sight of the little 'cow town' 
he was met by a courier traveling in haste from the mar- 
quis with a gentleman's apology and a cordial invitation 



76 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

to dine with hiin in town. And that was all there was of 
the sensational 'duel' with the French nobleman." 

Besides his experiences with cowboys and with a 
French gentleman of rank, there were experiences with 
Indians, though at the time Roosevelt lived on the Little 
Missouri, the Indians gave comparatively little trouble. 
Occasionally, however, parties of savage young bucks 
would treat lonely settlers badly, sometimes murdering 
them. These bands were usually composed of young 
fellows burning to distinguish themselves. He thus tells 
of what he calls a "trifling encounter with such a band:' ' 

"I was making my way along the edge of the bad 
lands, northward from my lower ranch, and was just 
crossing a plateau when five Indians rode up over the 
further rim. The instant they saw me they whipped out 
their guns and raced full speed at me, yelling and flogging 
their horses. I was on a favorite horse, Manitou, who was 
a wise old fellow, with nerves not to be shaken by anything. 
I at once leaped off him and stood with my rifle ready. 

" It was possible that the Indians were merely making 
a bluff and intended no mischief. But I did not like their 
actions, and I thought it likely if I allowed them to get 
hold of me they would at least take my horse and rifle, and 
possibly kill me. So I waited until they were a hundred 
yards off and then drew a bead on the first. Indians — and 
for the matter of that, white men — do not like to ride in on 
a man who is cool and means shooting, and in a twinkling 
every man was lying over the side of his horse, and all 
five had turned and were galloping backwards, having 
altered their course as quickly as so many teal ducks. 

"After this one of them made the peace sign, with 
his blanket first, and then, as he rode toward me, with his 
open hand. I halted him at a fair distance and asked him 



C TO p 




THE ELKHORN RANCH 77 

what he wanted. He exclaimed, 'How? Me good Injun, 
me good Injun,' and tried to show rne the dirty piece of 
paper on which his agency pass was written. I told him 
with sincerity that I was glad that he was a good Indian, 
but that he must not come any closer. He then asked for 
sugar and tobacco. I told him I had none. Another 
Indian began slowly drifting toward me in spite of my 
calling out to keep back, so I once more aimed w T ith my 
rifle, whereupon both Indians slipped to the other side of 
their horses and galloped off, with oaths that did credit 
to at least one side of their acquaintance with English. 
I now mounted and pushed over the plateau on to the 
open prairie. In those days an Indian, although not as 
good a shot as a white man, was infinitely better at crawl- 
ing under and taking advantage of cover; and the worst 
thing a white man could do was to get into cover, whereas 
out in the open if he kept his head he had a good chance 
of standing off even half a dozen assailants. The Indians 
accompanied me for a couple of miles. Then I reached the 
open prairie, and resumed my northward ride, not being 
further molested.' ' 

Roosevelt owed much to his Western experience. 
His terms in the New York Legislature had brought him 
into intimate contact with political conditions in the East. 
His ranch life brought him into equally intimate contact 
with totally different conditions. Each condition was in 
its way typical of varied phases of our national life. There- 
after he knew the men of the "new' ' country, though that 
"new" country might be hundreds of miles further south- 
west or northeast than the Little Missouri. 

Just as many of the politicians in his Assembly district 
and in the New York Legislature became his life-long 
friends, so most of those who came into contact with him 



78 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

on the cattle ranch or in his various hunting trips ever 
afterwards respected and trusted him. As for politics I 
do not think that any of them ever had any politics, after 
he became a national political figure, They would have 
voted for him on any ticket, and that without reading 
the platform. Many years afterwards four of these men, 
the four with whom he had played old sledge and chased 
a bobcat the first night he spent at Chimney Butte, in Sep- 
tember, 1883, and who had been his closest associates, J. 
A. Ferris, S. N. Ferris, W. J. Merrifield and G. W. Meyer, 
came to the First National Progressive Convention as 
delegates. He had his picture taken with all four, and 
five more pleased men never stood before a camera. 

As we read his own account of the different characters 
he met, our first impression is that they must have been 
an extraordinarily fine lot. Undoubtedly some of them, 
men like Seth Bullock, for instance, justify his assertion 
that Owen Wister's "Virginian" is not exaggerated. But 
with most of them we soon perceive that our impression 
is due largely to the fact that he liked them and saw the 
best in them. They were just ordinary men, put into con- 
ditions with which the average liver in towns or on farms 
does not come in contact. Roosevelt got the best out of 
them because he gave them his best, He was not there to 
play at ranching, and to do a little hunting; but to do a 
man's part with men, in a world of men. It caught and 
held their imagination that this man, who could write 
books, who had wealth, education, and position in the 
great world of the East, was a good fellow and their friend. 
Is it any wonder that when the opportunity came, he could 
raise a regiment of Rough Riders? Is it any wonder that 
when he became President the chief event in the life of a 
far Western friend was to go to Washington and see the 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 79 

President, or that, in trouble, often serious and sometimes 
deserved, they turned to him with the confidence of 
children? 

"Dear Colonel: I write you because I am in trouble." 
. . . His heart would sink, for he knew that the 
trouble of a cow-puncher friend would not infrequently 
be serious. Sometimes, however, his sense of humor over- 
came his sense of regret that the trouble was too well 
deserved to make it proper for him to interfere. One cor- 
respondent, to whom he gave the fictitious name of Gritto, 
wrote, "Dear Colonel: I write you because I am in 
trouble. I have shot a lady in the eye. But, Colonel, I 
was not shooting at the lady. I was shooting at my wife.' ' 

One Major Llewellyn, who was Federal District Attor- 
ney under him in New Mexico, often wrote him letters 
filled with bits of interesting gossip about the comrades. 
One ran in part as follows : 

"Since I last wrote you Comrade Ritchie has killed a 
man in Colorado. I understand that the comrade was 
playing a poker game, and the man sat into the game and 
used such language that Comrade Ritchie had to shoot. 
Comrade Webb has killed two men in Beaver, Arizona. 
Comrade Webb is in the Forest Service, and the killing 
was in the line of professional duty. I was out at the pen- 
itentiary the other day and saw Comrade Gritto, who, 
you may remember, was put there for shooting his sister- 
in-law (this was the first information the Colonel received 
as to the identity of the lady who was shot in the eye). 
Since he was in there, Comrade Boyne has run off to old 
Mexico with his (Gritto's) wife, and the people of Grant 
County think he ought to be let out." 

In commenting on this letter, Roosevelt calls attention 
to the fact that the sporting instinct of the inhabitants of 



80 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Grant County had been aroused. They felt that as Com- 
rade Boyne had had a fair start, the other comrade should 
be let out — to see what would happen. 

These unfortunate ones, however, were the exceptions. 
Most of his friends of ranch days have changed with the 
country, and are now to be found as solid and substantial 
citizens, living in orderly communities where there are 
schools and paved streets and trolley-cars and other ad- 
juncts of a settled civilization. 

Occasionally he went on long hunting trips to the 
Rocky Mountains, usually with his foreman, Merrifield,or 
later with Tazewell Woody, John Willis or John Goff . In 
his "Hunting Trips of a Ranchman," he gives us the fol- 
lowing brief account of a bear hunt with Merrifield : 

"We could follow the tracks by the slight scrapes of 
the claws on the bark, or by bent and broken twigs; and 
we advanced with noiseless caution, slowly climbing over 
dead trunks and upturned stumps, and not letting a 
branch rustle or catch our clothes. When in the middle 
of the thicket we crossed what was almost a breastwork of 
fallen logs, and Merrifield, who was leading, paused by the 
upright stem of a large pine. 

"And there, not ten steps off, was the great bear, 
slowly rising from his bed among the young spruces. He 
had heard us, but apparently hardly knew where or what 
we were, for he reared up on his haunches sidewise to us. 
Then he saw us, and dropped down again on all fours, the 
shaggy hair on his neck and shoulders seeming to bristle 
as he turned to us. As he sank down on his forefeet I 
raised the rifle. His head was bent slightly down, and 
when I saw the top of his white head fairly between the 
small, glittering, evil eyes, I pulled the trigger. Half rising 
up, the huge beast fell over on the side in the death- 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 81 

throes, the ball having gone into his brain, striking as 
fairly between the eyes as if the distance had been meas- 
ured by a carpenter's rule. The whole thing was over 
in twenty seconds from the time I sighted the game.' ' 

He describes another hunt, in Idaho, where he was 
less fortunate, and had a narrow escape from taking the 
bear's place as victim. This account also shows his vivid 
style of writing. After relating how he found the grizzly, 
he continues: 

"I held true, aiming behind the shoulder, and my bul- 
let shattered the point or lower end of his heart, taking out 
a big nick. Instantly the great bear turned with a hoarse 
roar of fury and challenge, blowing the bloody foam from 
his mouth, so that I saw the gleam of his white fangs; and 
then he charged straight at me, crashing and bounding 
through the laurel bushes, so that it was hard to aim. 

"I waited till he came to a fallen tree, raking him, as 
he topped it, with a ball which entered his chest and went 
through the cavity of his body; but he neither swerved nor 
flinched, and at the moment I did not know that I had 
struck him. He came steadily on, and in another moment 
was almost upon me. I fired for his forehead, but my bul- 
let went low, smashing his lower jaw and going into the 
neck. I leaped to one side almost as I pulled the trigger, 
and through the hanging smoke the first thing I saw was 
his paw, as he made a vicious side blow at me. 

"The rush of the charge carried him past. As he 
struck he lurched forward, leaving a pool of bright blood 
where his muzzle hit the ground, but he recovered him- 
self and made two or three jumps onward, while I hur- 
riedly jammed a couple of cartridges into the magazine, 
my rifle holding but four, all of which I had fired. Then 
he tried to pull up; but as he did so, his muscles seemed 



82 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

to give way, his head dropped, and he rolled over and over 
like a shot rabbit. Each of my first two bullets had in- 
flicted a mortal wound." 

Roosevelt the hunter was also Roosevelt the lover 
of nature, and it was his hunting experiences that enabled 
him to give some of his most beautiful descriptions of 
nature. Take, for instance, this description of the Bad 
Lands, which not only shows his skill in word painting, but 
his love for nature as she exhibits herself in the great bare 
places of the world: 

"The tracks led into one of the wildest and most deso- 
late parts of the Bad Lands. It was now the heat of the 
day, the brazen sun shining out of a cloudless sky, and not 
the least breeze stirring. At the bottom of the valley, in 
the deep, narrow bed of the winding watercourse, lay a 
few tepid little pools almost dried up. Thick groves of 
stunted cedars stood here and there in the glen-like pockets 
of the high buttes, the peaks and sides of which were bare, 
and only their lower, terrace-like ledges thinly clad with 
coarse, withered grass and sprawling sage-brush; the 
parched hillsides were riven by deep, twisted gorges, with 
brushwood on the bottoms; and the cliffs of coarse clay 
were cleft and seamed by sheer-sided, canon-like gullies. 

"In the narrow ravines, closed in by barren, sun-baked 
walls, the hot air stood still and sultry; the only living 
things were the rattlesnakes, and of these I have never 
elsewhere seen so many. Some basked in the sun, stretched 
out at their ugly length of mottled brown and yellow. 
Others lay half under stones or twisted in the roots of 
the sage-brush, and looked straight at me with that 
strange, sullen, evil gaze, never shifting or moving, that 
is the property only of serpents — and certain men — while 
one or two coiled and rattled menacingly as I stepped near.' ' 



THE ELKHORN RANCH 83 

But the lover of nature was also lover of the chase for 
the joy of it. 

" No one,' ' he writes, " but he who has partaken thereof 
can understand the keen delight of hunting in lonely lands. 
For him it is the joy of the horse well ridden and the rifle 
well held; for him the long days of toil and hardship reso- 
lutely endured, and crowned at the end with triumph. 
In after years there shall come forever to his mind the 
memory of endless prairies shimmering in the bright sun ; 
of vast snow-clad wastes lying desolate under gray skies ; 
of the melancholy marshes; of the rush of mighty rivers; 
of the breath of the evergreen forest in summer; of the 
crooning of ice-armored pines at the touch of the winds of 
winter; of cataracts roaring between hoary mountain 
masses; of all the innumerable sights and sounds of the 
wilderness; of its immensity and misery; and of the silences 
that brood in its still depths." 



CHAPTER VI 

Roosevelt and the Civil Service 

WHILE Roosevelt was more than half immersed 
in his ranch life and in his book writing, he still 
found time for political activity. In 1886 he 
received the Republican nomination for Mayor of New 
York City. The contest, for several reasons, was hope- 
less from the start. Cleveland was at that time in the 
middle of his first presidential term and his personal 
popularity, of course, contributed to the strength of his 
party throughout the country. New York was naturally 
a Democratic city, and the Tammany braves were strong 
and well organized. And lastly, Henry George, the father 
of the single tax movement, whose writings had brought 
him into considerable prominence, was the nominee of an 
independent third party which recruited its strength 
largely from the Republican ranks. In the face of these 
difficulties, Roosevelt accepted the nomination and made 
a spirited campaign. Abram S. Hewitt, the Democratic 
nominee, won an easy victory, receiving ninety thousand 
votes, while George received sixty-eight thousand and 
Roosevelt sixty thousand. 

After the election of Harrison in 1888, Roosevelt 
hoped to be made Assistant Secretary of State. He was 
politically ambitious and was at that time particularly 
interested in our foreign relations. But Blaine, the Sec- 
retary of State, did not fancy such an appointment, and 
Roosevelt consequently failed to secure it; instead, Presi- 
dent Harrison offered him an appointment as one of the 

(84) 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 85 

three Commissioners of the United States Civil Service. 
Many of his friends were rather surprised when he 
accepted, because it was generally supposed that the 
Civil Service Commission was a political graveyard. 
The work done by the Commission offered little opportu- 
nity for winning political advancement, because it lacked 
spectacular possibilities and because an honest enforcement 
of the law necessarily involved conflicts with the powers 
upon whom preferment almost necessarily depended. 

Roosevelt, however, accepted the appointment and 
at once threw himself with ardor into the work of the 
Commission. As a member of the New York Legislature 
he had, in 1883, drafted a Civil Service bill in New York. 
This bill and the act of Congress creating a real federal 
merit system were approved by Governor Cleveland and 
by President Arthur respectively, at about the same time. 
Ever since the beginning of his public career Roosevelt 
has been a staunch supporter of civil service reform. The 
evils of the spoils system were not then so obvious to the 
average citizen as they are now. Beginning with the 
administration of President Jackson it had been the uni- 
versal practice when an administration of one party was 
succeeded by another to make a clean sweep of all offices 
within the appointive power of the President. When 
Cleveland and Hendricks were elected in 1884, Hen- 
dricks rejoiced his followers by the statement that "he 
wished to take the boys in out of the cold to warm their 
toes." Their toes had been cold for twenty-four years and 
they were, of course, more than eager to get close to the fire. 

Hendricks* wish was gratified. During Cleveland's 
first administration, for instance, all of the railway mail 
service employees who were Republicans were turned out 
and Democrats were put in their places. The natural 



86 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

result of this action was an utter demoralization of the 
railway mail service. Four years later the Republicans 
came back into power and promptly reversed the process 
by sweeping out the Democrats. Fortunately, the pro- 
visions of the Civil Service law were made applicable to 
the railway mail service before this last process had been 
completed; but the party in power took advantage of the 
short time at their disposal to get rid of as many of their 
political enemies as possible. This system of removal and 
appointment had no relation whatever to the efficiency of 
the government employees nor to the good of the service, 
and certainly justified Roosevelt's statement that the 
spoils system "has been for seventy years the most po- 
tent of all forces tending to bring about the degradation 
of our politics." 

His fellow Commissioners were Charles Lyman of 
Connecticut and Hugh S. Thompson, ex-Governor of 
South Carolina. Thompson was later succeeded by 
George D. Johnston of Louisiana, who was in turn suc- 
ceeded by John R. Proctor of Kentucky. During the 
six years of Roosevelt's service, the Commission pursued 
its course with a single-minded devotion to the public 
welfare. In 1889 only a fraction of the government em- 
ployees fell within the scope of the Civil Service act; this 
fraction formed what was known as the classified service. 
It was the constant aim of the Commission to extend the 
classified service as rapidly as possible, and in addition, 
of course, to see that the law was administered thoroughly 
and fairly. The system of competitive examinations 
which was then comparatively new was not in Roosevelt's 
opinion perfect, but it was better than any other system 
which had yet been devised and the results obtained from 
its use were almost uniformly excellent. 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 87 

In enforcing the Civil Service law the Commissioners 
adhered to three principles: publicity, absolute political 
impartiality, and continual investigation by the Com- 
mission. Under the preceding Commission there had 
been an honest attempt to enforce the law but its unpop- 
ularity with members of Congress had led the president 
of the Commission to avoid publicity as much as possible. 
He felt that to advertise its work was simply to invite 
unjust criticism, and so he and his associates performed 
their labors as inconspicuously as they could. Under 
the regime of the new Commissioners this was entirely 
reversed. Their theory was that since the Civil Service Act 
was a source of great good to the country, to advertise 
it was to insure its popularity. They accordingly took 
every occasion not only to advertise the holding of exam- 
inations but to publish the names of successful candidates 
and to invite an inspection of the records of their office by 
anyone who had a proper motive for inspecting them. 

Under the Civil Service law each state was permitted 
a certain quota of appointees in the classified service. 
During the first six years of the operation of the act all 
of the Southern states had continually been far behind 
in their quotas, due apparently to the prevalent idea that 
in making appointments the old system of political 
influence must still be the controlling one. In the summer 
of 1890, Congress passed an act which created six hundred 
new clerkships at Washington. The Commission imme- 
diately seized upon this opportunity to push the cause of 
civil service in the South. They advertised the coming 
examinations extensively in the Southern papers and took 
pains to point out that the appointees would be selected 
from those who passed the highest examinations and that 
no candidate need fear adverse political influence. Roose- 



88 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

velt called a meeting of the Southern Congressmen and 
of reporters from the Southern newspapers in his office 
and impressed upon them the fact that the examinations 
and recommendations for appointment would be con- 
ducted without any regard whatever for the political 
affiliations of those who came forward to be examined. 
The result was encouraging. Southern aspirants for clerk- 
ships plucked up heart and took the examinations in very 
considerable numbers, with the result that nearly three 
hundred of the six hundred clerks were appointed from 
the South. Most of these three hundred were, of course, 
Democrats, and the fact that they were appointed under 
a Republican administration went far to upset the popular 
Southern prejudice against the Civil Service Commission. 

If the law were to be properly enforced, it was of 
course necessary for the Commissioners to keep a constant 
watch upon the governmental offices which fell within 
the classified service. A large part of their work, there- 
fore, consisted in making investigations, either personally 
or by agent, which resulted more than once in recommen- 
dations for the removal of government appointees who had 
abused the opportunities of their positions. Roosevelt 
himself preferred personal investigations where possible. 
He said that he could get more information by a few 
minutes' talk with the clerk who had charge of the business 
under discussion than by a fortnight's formal corre- 
spondence with the head of the department. 

One of these investigations led to an incident which 
was the source of considerable comment at the time. 
Serious frauds had been practiced at the postoffice in 
Milwaukee, especially in the appointment of clerks with- 
out reference to the merit system. Roosevelt investi- 
gated the matter and soon found that the blame largely 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 89 

centered upon a member of the local civil service board 
in Milwaukee, named Shidy, who had had access to the 
papers of the Commission. Roosevelt therefore inter- 
viewed Shidy personally and soon convinced himself that 
he had gone to the right man to get the information he 
needed. Shidy refused to talk unless he was promised 
immunity and the retention of his place in the postoffice. 
The Commissioner decided that it was important to get 
the man's testimony and accordingly gave him the 
required assurance. Shidy then told his story, which 
resulted in the dismissal of the Milwaukee postmaster. 
Shortly thereafter Shidy was himself dismissed. Roosevelt, 
in order to fulfil his promise, tried hard to have him rein- 
stated, and, failing in this, procured him a clerkship in 
the census office which did not fall within the classi- 
fied service. One of the Washington newspapers learned 
how Shidy had been taken care of and published a series of 
sensational charges against the Commission alleging, 
among other things, that Roosevelt himself was one of 
the worst of spoilsmen. The Commissioner's answer to 
this was to demand an immediate investigation, in the 
course of which he frankly told the whole story. As a 
result of this investigation the congressional committee 
fully supported him and in their findings endorsed the 
action he had taken. 

Most of the examinations held under the Civil Service 
act were, of course, written. Separate examinations were 
held then as now for different positions. For letter car- 
riers, for instance, one test was in reading addresses, and 
in this test they were marked partly for speed and partly 
for accuracy in their reading. Candidates for govern- 
ment inspectorships, on the other hand, were subjected to 
examinations bearing directly upon the work which they 



90 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

would be called upon to do. In one examination, for 
example, they were presented with this problem: "Some 
person will be pointed out to you for description; notice 
him carefully and then write as brief a telegram as pos- 
sible to the United States Marshal at Baltimore notifying 
him that this man will arrive on a designated train and 
that a warrant is out for his arrest on the charge of 
embezzling postal funds." Roosevelt suggested that 
customs inspectors on the Texas border should pass a 
practical examination in horsemanship and in the han- 
dling of a revolver, but the suggestion was not adopted at 
the time. It is interesting to find that, a good many 
years later, applicants for this position were required 
to produce special vouchers of their proficiency in 
the branches whose importance Roosevelt had thus 
emphasized. 

His attitude on the subject of promotion was a shock 
to many of his friends among the civil service reformers. 
During his service on the Commission there was no occa- 
sion for making his position in this matter public, because 
the Commission had no control over appointments or 
removals. But when he became one of the Police Commis- 
sioners of the City of New York, the question became a 
vital one for him. He said himself that in his position in 
the matter he split from the bulk of his "professional 
civil service reform friends." "The reason," he says, 
"for a written competitive entrance examination is that 
it is impossible for the head of the office, or the candidate's 
prospective immediate superior himself, to know the aver- 
age candidate or to test his ability. But when once in 
office, the best way to test any man's ability is by long 
experience in seeing him actually at work. His promotion 
should depend upon the judgment formed of him by 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 91 

his superiors." He felt that the matter of civil service 
reform was purely practical. He advocated competitive 
examinations because he believed that they advanced 
the interests of the public service, but he had no particular 
interest in competitive examinations for their own sake, 
and did not feel that any moral principle was irrevocably 
associated with them. He could think of no better system 
for selecting non-political subordinates, and, therefore, he 
went with the civil service reformers in advocating a 
method of initial selection by examination; but when it 
came to promotion, experience had shown him that exam- 
inations were of little use and he therefore did not hesitate 
to abandon them. 

The Civil Service Commissioners under Harrison and 
Cleveland did not get very much assistance from the 
White House. Both of these Presidents were in favor of 
the system, but they hesitated in extending it because to 
do so necessarily involved conflict with their party 
leaders. But in the House and Senate there were several 
ardent champions of the cause of civil service reform. 
During Roosevelt's term of office there were many lively 
tilts in Congress with respect to the operation of the 
Civil Service act and the very existence of the Commis- 
sion was more than once threatened. 

The favorite method adopted by the opponents of the 
system was to attempt to cut off the annual appropriation 
for the work of the Commission. On one occasion they 
failed to cut the appropriation entirely but succeeded in 
considerably reducing the amount needed for the expense 
of conducting the examinations. Roosevelt's answer to 
this was characteristic. He found out which Congress- 
men had refused to vote the necessary money and then 
sent for the schedule of examinations. He carefully struck 



92 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

out from the list of districts where examinations would 
be held the districts which these men represented. 
Having done this, he called in the newspaper reporters 
and gave the matter due publicity, explaining just what 
he had done and why he had done it. There was loud 
complaint of his action by the offended Congressmen but 
in the future the Commission got the money that it 
needed. 

Senator Gorman of Maryland was, during Cleveland's 
administration, the leader of the majority party in the 
Senate. He was a strong opponent of the merit system. 
One day in a speech in the Senate he attacked the Com- 
mission and told the pathetic story of a "bright young 
man in the city of Baltimore" who had taken the exami- 
nation for the position of letter carrier. The bright young 
man, according to the Senator, had been asked to tell 
the most direct route from Baltimore to Japan, together 
with several other questions equally irrelevant. Roose- 
velt happened to read the speech as soon as it was pub- 
lished and immediately wrote the Senator asking him to 
give the date and place of the examination, and inviting 
him to inspect all of the Commission's examination papers 
for letter carriers to see whether he could find the partic- 
ular questions to which he had alluded in his speech. The 
Senator was unable to give the particulars and did not 
accept the invitation to inspect the examination papers. 
The incident was closed by a characteristic public letter 
from Roosevelt which ended thus: 

"High-minded, sensitive Mr. Gorman! Clinging, 
trustful Mr. Gorman! Nothing could shake his belief in 
that * bright young man.' Apparently, he did not even 
try to find out his name — if he had a name; in fact, his 
name, like everything else about him, remains to this day 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 93 

wrapped in the Stygian mantle of an abysmal mystery, 
Still less has Mr. Gorman tried to verify the statements 
made to him. It is enough for him that they were made. 
No harsh suspicion, no stern demand for evidence or proof, 
appeals to his artless and unspoiled soul. He believes 
whatever he is told, even when he has forgotten the name 
of the teller, or never knew it. It would indeed be difficult 
to find an instance of a more abiding confidence in human 
nature — even in anonymous human nature. And this is 
the end of the tale of Arcadian Mr. Gorman and his elusive 
friend, the bright young man without a name!" 

During the sessions of the Fifty-third Congress, Rep- 
resentative Bynum of Indiana introduced a bill which 
provided that all the Democrats who had been turned 
out of the railway mail service by the Republicans more 
than four years ago should be reinstated. The bill received 
the solid support of the Democrats and passed the House. 
In the Senate it was pushed by Senator Vilas of Wiscon- 
sin and only failed through the vigilance of Senator Lodge, 
who was a warm friend both of Commissioner Roosevelt 
and of the merit system. The bill had been referred to 
the committee of which Vilas was chairman. When he 
reported it to the Senate he asked for its consideration by 
unanimous consent and for its passage on the ground 
that it related to a matter of small importance. When 
the bill was read the words "classified civil service" 
caught Senator Lodge's ear and he insisted upon an 
explanation. On finding out the true subject-matter of 
the bill Lodge refused to join in the unanimous consent 
for its consideration, with the result that the pressure of 
other business prevented it from coming up that session. 
Had the bill passed it would have formed a very danger- 
ous precedent. 



94 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

On another occasion an attempt was made by the 
enemies of the Commission to hinder its work by reducing 
the salary of the secretary. Congressman Breckenridge 
of Kentucky, in the course of the discussion upon the 
annual appropriation bill, objected, upon a technical par- 
liamentary ground, to the item which appropriated 
$2,000 to the secretary of the Commission, and caused the 
bill to be passed carrying an appropriation for only $1,600 
for this particular position. The same parliamentary 
objection applied equally to the salaries of twenty or 
thirty other officers, including the President's private 
secretary and the First Assistant Postmaster General. 
Their salaries, however, were not touched by the House. 
When the matter reached the Senate, Senator Lodge and 
his friends were ready and they made such a determined 
fight that the salary was put back at $2,000, and the bill 
eventually became a law in that form. 

One of Roosevelt's last acts as Civil Service Commis- 
sioner was to write a letter to Judson Grenell, of Detroit, 
on April 25, 1895, by which he put an end to an amusing 
and illuminating controversy between Mr. Grenell and the 
Commission. It appeared that Grenell, who was a news- 
paper man, had taken the examination for the position of 
assistant statistican for the Department of Agriculture. 
Of the twelve men who took the examination Grenell, 
with a grade of forty-four, stood eleventh. He objected 
to the marking of the papers and to the recommendation 
of the Commissioners, and wrote them, asking for the 
averages of the other men who had taken the examination, 
and pointing out what he considered serious defects in the 
administration of the Civil Service act. To Roosevelt 
was assigned the duty of answering, and he did so with 
evident delight. First, he gave his correspondent all the 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 95 

grades, beginning with ninety and ending with forty-two, 
and carefully pointed out that there was only one man 
who stood lower than Mr. Grenell in the final rating. 
He corrected the statement that there was "a rising tide 
of public opinion against the system of competitive exam- 
inations" by pointing to the results of recent elections in 
Chicago and New York State which had endorsed the 
merit system. He showed that the proficiency of the 
railway mail service, as measured by the percentage of 
correct routings, had almost tripled within the past 
five years and he ended with this statement which was 
undoubtedly correct: 

"The past year has witnessed greater progress toward 
the full accomplishment of the reform idea in national, 
city and municipal governments, taken as a whole, than 
in any other year since the original law was passed.' ' 

Roosevelt served four years under President Harrison 
and discharged the duties of his office so impartially and 
with such an entire disregard of political affiliations that he 
was reappointed by President Cleveland, and served under 
him until, in 1895, he resigned to become one of the Police 
Commissioners of the city of New York. During his six 
years as Commissioner fourteen thousand positions had 
been added to the classified service, and the total number 
of offices falling within the scope of the Commissioners' 
activities had increased from twenty-one thousand to 
nearly fifty thousand. What was more important, the 
methods of the Civil Service Commission and the possi- 
bilities of the classified service had been widely adver- 
tised and had won popular approval. In a public state- 
ment made after he had left the Commission, he said: 

"People sometimes grow a little downhearted about 
the reform. When they feel in this mood it would be well 



96 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

for them to reflect on what has actually been gained in the 
past six years. By the inclusion of the railway mail 
service, the smaller free delivery offices, the Indian school 
service, the internal revenue service, and other less im- 
portant branches, the extent of the public service which 
is under the protection of the law has been more than 
doubled, and there are now nearly fifty thousand em- 
ployees of the Federal government who have been with- 
drawn from the degrading influences that rule under the 
spoils system." 

When, six years later, Roosevelt became President, he 
still had, in full measure, the interest in the merit system 
which had been his since he entered politics. In his first 
message to Congress he urged the extension of the system 
to the insular possessions, and in his second annual mes- 
sage urged that it should be extended to the District of 
Columbia. By executive orders, made at various times 
during his administration, he was able to accomplish much 
that Congress had failed to do. For instance, he wished 
Congress to bring United States consuls within the clas- 
sified service, and upon their failure to do so, he issued an 
executive order requiring applications for the position of 
consul in certain grades to take competitive examinations. 
Similar orders covered many laborers in government 
employ. In addition to adding to the classified service the 
President promulgated other rules which increased the 
efficiency of the Commission. He forbade employees 
within the classified service to engage actively in politics 
and directed that recommendations for promotion must 
come in every case from a man's superior instead of from 
his political friends. During his presidency the Civil 
Service Commission reported that the number of classi- 
fied positions subject to competitive examinations had 



THE CIVIL SERVICE 97 

nearly doubled, having grown from 110,000 in 1901 to 
206,000 in 1908. 

During his six years on the Civil Service Commission, 
Roosevelt had abundant practical experience in the oper- 
ation of the merit system, experience which was to stand 
him in good stead in later life as Police Commissioner, 
Governor and President. He always remained a firm 
friend of civil service reform, but he had, in 1895, begun 
to see that civil service reform was not enough. He saw 
the signs of a great national awakening which was to 
concern itself not simply with political conditions but 
with social and industrial justice. In this awakening, he 
himself was destined to take the leading part. 



CHAPTER VH 

Police Commissioner 

THE head of a great police force in a modern city 
may be perfectly honest, and yet his conception of 
his full duty may be to do no more than to sit at 
his desk day after day receiving reports from his subor- 
dinates. Theodore Roosevelt was not that kind of a police 
head. He made a great success of his position as president 
of the Board of Police Commissioners of New York City, 
because, while he did not neglect his desk, he went out 
and got at essential facts for himself. He knew his force, 
not only his captains and lieutenants, but a large number 
of his sergeants and roundsmen and patrolmen. The re- 
forms which he instituted and carried out were based not 
merely on reports but on personal knowledge of conditions. 
No man knew better than he the value of arousing public 
attention by striking and vigorous action on the part of an 
executive. In the two years that he was Police Commis- 
sioner there were not many days when the pugnacious 
and forceful head of the police did not furnish the reporters 
with interesting copy and the city editors with headlines. 
During the early '90's, political corruption in New 
York City had reached its high-water mark. Under 
the dominance of Richard Croker, Tammany Hall 
owned the city, body and soul. Every official, from the 
policeman on his beat to the judge on the bench, was 
compelled not only to contribute to the Tammany war 
chest, but to discharge his official duties in the manner 
dictated by Mr. Croker and his lieutenants. The greatest 

(98) 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 99 

evils were centered in the administration of the police 
force. Here the possibilities for blackmail were almost 
unlimited. The proprietors of disorderly houses and those 
interested in the liquor trade had formed with the police 
a conspiracy by virtue of which they were permitted to 
violate the law in return for their political support and for 
a share in the profits of their unlawful business. 

While the Democratic party controlled the city of New 
York, the Republicans usually had a working majority 
in the state. This fact gave rise to the conditions under 
which Roosevelt's appointment as Police Commissioner 
became possible. During the legislative session of 1894, 
the Republican majority procured the appointment of a 
committee to investigate political conditions in New York 
City. Senator Lexow was made the chairman of this 
committee. Numerous hearings were held, in the course 
of which there occurred revelations of the most startling 
nature. 

From the testimony it appeared that it was the prac- 
tice to sell appointments to office at fixed figures. For 
instance, the regular charge for an appointment as patrol- 
man was $300.00. The subordinates thus appointed re- 
couped themselves by collecting blackmail from liquor 
dealers and from the keepers of disorderly houses. The 
system became so businesslike that saloon-keepers who 
wished to remain open on Sunday were privileged to do so, 
in spite of the law, upon payment of a fixed sum. The 
game of policy flourished within prescribed geographical 
limits, each one of which was assigned to a "policy king" 
who handled the business and paid the necessary black- 
mail to the police. Shoeblacks, and push-cart and fruit 
venders were permitted to obstruct the streets and side- 
walks upon payment of money for the privilege. A regu- 



100 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

lar initiation fee was charged by the police, and thereafter 
annual dues were levied and in most cases readily paid. 

As a result of these exposures, the independents and 
the Republicans of the city combined in the fall of 1894 
and succeeded in ousting Tammany and in electing Col- 
onel William L. Strong as mayor of the city. Strong was 
the first reform mayor who had ever taken office in New 
York and he made such use of his opportunities as circum- 
stances permitted. He offered the position of Chief of 
the Street Cleaning Bureau to Roosevelt and when he 
declined it, appointed Colonel George E. Waring, whose 
administration of that office is famous in the annals of 
New York. William Brookfield, an independent Repub- 
lican business man, became Commissioner of Public 
Works. On the municipal civil service board the new 
mayor placed Everett P. Wheeler and Godkin of the 
Evening Post, who were described by a contemporary 
writer as "experienced and obdurate reformers." 

The Legislature of 1895 had a considerable Republican 
majority and had been elected largely by the votes of resi- 
dents of New York City who were anxious for action in 
Albany which would help to cure the situation in the 
metropolis. But when the Legislature adjourned on May 
16th, the reformers were sorely disappointed. The new 
statute for the government of the police force did not meet 
public expectations. It provided for four Commissioners, 
two of whom were to be appointed from one party and two 
from the other. There was also a Chief of Police, whom 
the Commissioners were to appoint, but whom they could 
not remove without a regular trial subject to review by 
the courts of law. The Chief of Police and any one Com- 
missioner had power, in most cases, to prevent action by 
the other three Commissioners. The granting of execu- 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 101 

tive power to so numerous a body and the provision 
which made a dead-lock so easy became fruitful sources 
of trouble. 

Mayor Strong selected Roosevelt as president of the 
Board and as the other three members, Colonel Frederick 
D. Grant, son of General Grant, Avery D. Andrews, a 
young lawyer of West Point training, and Andrew D. 
Parker. The other Commissioners were, at first in entire 
harmony with their president, and the board started on 
its career with every chance for success. 

Two problems confronted the Commissioners at the 
outset. One of these was to take the police force entirely 
out of politics, and the other was to ensure the enforce- 
ment of the law. Of course all was not plain sailing by 
any means. Years of corruption had produced a growth 
which a single operation could not remove, and, in addition, 
the Board of Commissioners did not maintain, through- 
out the term of Roosevelt's service, the unanimity which 
characterized them at the beginning. The system of checks 
and balances to which I have already alluded offered con- 
siderable opportunity to the obstructionist. One of the 
members of the Board was to some extent affiliated with 
the type of politician against whom the people had risen 
to elect Mayor Strong. This Commissioner gradually 
grew more and more out of sympathy with his associates 
and became the source of considerable difficulty. Colonel 
Grant, too, although perfectly honest, was perhaps inclined 
to resent a little the leadership of a man who was consid- 
erably his junior. During the month of August, 1805, the 
hostile press was able to announce with considerable satis- 
faction that a real split in the board had taken place over 
the discharge of a police captain. 

Differences of temperament were exaggerated by the 



102 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

newspapers until they became moral differences, and 
Roosevelt's enemies lost no chance of imperiling the suc- 
cess of his work by endeavoring to alienate his associates. 

Heretofore it had been impossible to secure a position 
on the police force unless money and political influence 
were brought to bear. As a first step toward eliminating 
this system, the Commissioners announced that appoint- 
ments to the force would be given only to those who should 
satisfactorily pass a civil service examination. Any man 
within the proper age limits and a citizen of the United 
States who appeared was given the examination. He was 
obliged to furnish five vouchers for his good character and 
was subjected by the Commission to a searching test as to 
his physical and moral qualifications. This investigation 
eliminated four-fifths of the applicants. From those who 
remained, members of the police force were selected with- 
out any regard whatever for political connections, and 
usually with no knowledge of what their political connec- 
tions in fact were. 

When it came to promotions, Roosevelt differed from 
most of the civil service reformers. He held that promo- 
tions should be based principally upon a man's conduct 
as observed by his superiors. Consequently a list was 
kept of those policemen who had particularly distin- 
guished themselves by heroism and by physical prowess 
in the discharge of their duties. Those whose names were on 
this list were subjected to competitive examinations, upon 
the results of which their promotions in part depended. In 
selecting men for the positions of greatest responsibility 
special attention was given to the candidate's ability to 
handle men and to his success in repressing vice and 
disorder in the district within his control. 

Bravery in the discharge of duty was a sure road to the 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 103 

favor of the president of the Board. Roosevelt has 
recorded more than one instance to illustrate this. One of 
the first promotions made by the new Board after they had 
begun their work was by way of reward for such conduct. 
A roundsman who was old enough to be a veteran of the 
Civil War, and who had been on the force for twenty-two 
years, saved a woman from drowning in the spring of 1895. 
Roosevelt read of the feat in the report submitted to him 
and sent for the rescuer. The roundsman appeared in a 
state of considerable nervousness and agitation. He had, 
during his service on the force, saved some twenty-five 
persons from death by drowning, and on more than one 
occasion had saved persons from burning buildings. Twice 
he had received, upon the authorization of Congress, 
medals for distinguished gallantry. He was efficient and 
trustworthy and there was no blemish on his record. But 
he had no political backing and consequently had all these 
years failed of promotion. Now he thought that perhaps 
his chance had come. As a result of his interview with 
Roosevelt he became a sergeant, and it was not long before 
he justified the Commission's action by effecting his 
twenty-sixth rescue from drowning. 

In another case which occurred at about the same 
time, a patrolman pursued a gang of toughs who had just 
robbed and beaten a man in the street. The toughs scat- 
tered and the policeman pursued the ringleader. Suddenly 
the criminal, finding that he was losing ground, turned 
and fired. The ball passed through the policeman's 
helmet and just grazed his scalp, but he had in the 
same instant fired his own revolver with truer aim. As 
the officer reeled back from the shock of the bullet which 
had so nearly caused him his life, his adversary fell dead, shot 
through the heart. This man was promoted to roundsman. 



104 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

In connection with this incident it is interesting to 
note what Roosevelt says in regard to the use of weapons 
by the police : "I may explain that I have not the slightest 
sympathy with any policy which tends to put the police- 
man at the mercy of a tough or which deprives him of 
efficient weapons. While Police Commissioner, we pun- 
ished any brutality by the police with such immediate 
severity that all cases of brutality practically came to an 
end. No decent citizen had anything to fear from the 
police during the two years of my service. But we con- 
sistently encouraged the police to prove that the violent 
criminal who endeavored to molest them or to resist 
arrest or to interfere with them in the discharge of their 
duty, was himself in grave jeopardy; and we had every 
'gang' broken up and the members punished with 
whatever severity was necessary. Of course where pos- 
sible the officer merely crippled the criminal who was 
violent." 

Roosevelt himself took a keen personal interest in the 
individual success of his subordinates and in his personal 
relations with them. Shortly after he became Commis- 
sioner, a Jewish boy named Otto Raphael was introduced 
to him at a Bowery meeting. Raphael was a powerful, 
intelligent young fellow who had recently saved some 
women and children from a burning building by a display 
of pluck and strength which won the admiration of the 
Commissioner. At Roosevelt's suggestion Raphael took 
the civil service examination and secured an appointment 
to the force. This enabled him to educate his little broth- 
ers and sisters and to bring over from Russia two or three 
members of the family who had been left behind because 
of lack of funds. In speaking of this incident, Roosevelt 
characteristically remembers that he and Raphael were 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 105 

the only men in the police department who picked Fitz- 
simmons as a winner against Corbett. 

This elimination of politics from the police force nat- 
urally incurred the enmity of those politicians who had 
been accustomed for years to control the actions of the 
department. They succeeded in obtaining the repeal of 
the civil service law and joined with others of Roosevelt's 
enemies in the vicious attacks made upon him during his 
service as a Commissioner. 

Bicycle policemen were added to the force soon after 
the new Commissioners took hold. The automobile speed 
fiend had not yet come into being, but his prototype, the 
bicycle scorcher, was bad enough. It was the duty of the 
mounted police to stop runaways and arrest scorchers. 
In controlling runaway horses some of them acquired mar- 
velous skill. They learned to ride at full speed beside 
the horse's bridle and by a steady pressure upon the bit 
gradually to bring the frightened animal to a standstill, 
or to jump from a bicycle into a runaway vehicle and 
arrest the occupant whose reckless driving had been the 
cause of the trouble. Under Roosevelt's leadership, also, 
a pistol school was instituted which was put in charge of 
a sergeant named Petty, who was one of the champion 
revolver shots of the country. 

Roosevelt himself was always in the thick of action. 
He threw his whole soul into the performance of his job 
and carried its problems with him night and day. Not 
long after he came into office a serious strike occurred in 
New York City accompanied by violence and bloodshed. 
Finding that the situation did not improve with the pas- 
sage of time, he arranged to meet certain of the strikers in 
Clarendon Hall to see whether the difficulty could not be 
settled at a conference between them. The strikers mis- 



106 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

took their man, and after explaining their grievances 
resorted to threats. Roosevelt's attitude of sympathetic 
interest gave way immediately to an expression of stern 
determination. "Wait a moment, gentlemen." he said, 
"I begin to think that some of you have mistaken the 
purpose of my invitation. Remember this, please, before 
we go one step further. The man among you who advises 
or encourages violence is the enemy of all. We shall have 
order in this place and peace in this city before we have 
anything else; and the police will preserve it. Now, if the 
air is clear we can go on." His boldness and candor 
appealed strongly to the strikers and instead of anger or 
defiance, moved them to cheers. His conviction that 
the enforcement of law and order was paramount to 
all other considerations was shared, before he left office, 
by many of the labor leaders with whom he had come in 
contact, so that before his departure several of them called 
upon him to express their regret at this going. One of 
these, the secretary of the Journeyman Bakers' and Con- 
fectioners' International Union, wrote him: "I am 
particularly grateful for your liberal attitude toward 
organized labor, your cordial championship of those 
speaking in behalf of the toilers, and your evident desire 
to do the right thing as you saw it at whatever cost." 

Jacob A. Riis was at this time a constant companion 
of Roosevelt. Riis, as a newspaper reporter, had become 
intensely interested in the life of New York City's East 
Side and had recorded some of his observations in his book 
" How the Other Half Live." Going back to his office one 
day after an absence of some hours, Riis found on his desk 
Theodore Roosevelt's card with the simple inscription 
"I have read your book and I have come to help." It is 
hard to overestimate the value of these two men to one 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 107 

another during the next two years. Riis found a ready 
champion of the cause of his East Side friends and Roose- 
velt found a reliable man with an intimate knowledge of 
many matters which bore directly upon his work as a Police 
Commissioner. Many a night these two tramped the 
streets together, talking to policemen on their beats, find- 
ing others asleep or gossiping, observing conditions in the 
tenement districts and planning for the betterment of the 
city. Riis had concluded that the police lodging houses 
were nothing but free hotels for beggars, and at his 
instance they were discontinued. He had gathered con- 
siderable data in regard to health conditions in the 
tenements and these formed the basis of Roosevelt's action 
as an ex-officio member of the Health Board. 

During August of 1896, New York was visited with a 
wave of terrible heat which lasted for days. The death 
rate for some of these days increased from the normal 
average of twenty per thousand annually to fifty per 
thousand annually. To combat the pitiful effects of the 
heat, the city appropriated thousands of dollars to purchase 
ice which was distributed free under the direction of the 
Police Commissioners. The Health Department adopted 
stringent rules in regard to the milk supply. As a result of 
this and other precautions the death rate among babies was 
comparatively small. During the meeting at which Bryan 
was officially notified that he was the Democratic nominee 
for the Presidency, when 25,000 people were gathered in 
Madison Square Garden the Commissioners placed police 
surgeons in the basement of the building ready with ice- 
packs and other appliances to take care of cases of heat 
prostration. 

Before leaving the subject of the general conduct of 
the police force there is one instance winch will bear telling. 



108 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

A German preacher named Ahlwardt came over to New 
York to preach a crusade against the Jews. Many of the 
New York Jews took the matter very much to heart and 
asked Roosevelt to prevent the crusader from speaking. 
This the Commissioner refused to do. In the first place 
he doubted his right to stop the speech and in the second 
place he thought that to make the man ridiculous would 
be better than to make him a martyr. Accordingly, he 
detailed for Ahlwardt's protection a Jewish sergeant and 
a score or two of Jewish policemen, so that the worthy 
preacher delivered his invective against the Jews under 
the active protection of the objects of his attack. 

During the years of Roosevelt's service the Board of 
Police Commissioners accomplished much for the police 
force and for the city. But long after all other achieve- 
ments are forgotten, one will be remembered — the enforce- 
ment of the Sunday Closing Law. The statutes of the 
State of New York forbade the sale of liquor on Sunday. 
No one disputed this; in fact no one could dispute it. 
Under Tammany this law had been enforced, but only 
against those who were unable or unwilling to purchase 
immunity from its provisions. From Commissioner to 
patrolman the police force had exacted blackmail from 
the saloon-keepers. The liquor dealer who could not 
produce the necessary cash and votes found that his place 
of business was closed on Sunday, while his rival across 
the street was not only earning the biggest money of the 
week, but was swiftly stealing away his steady customers. 
"The police," says Roosevelt, "used the partial and spas- 
modic enforcement of the law as a means of collecting 
blackmail. The result was that the officers of the law, 
the politicians, and the saloon-keepers became inextrica- 
bly tangled in a network of crime and connivance at crime. 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 109 

The most powerful saloon-keepers controlled the poli- 
ticians and the police, while the latter in turn terrorized 
and blackmailed all the other saloon-keepers. It was 
not a case of non-enforcement of the law. The law was 
very actively enforced, but it was enforced with corrupt 
discrimination. ' ' 

Roosevelt and his associates had no particular fond- 
ness for the Sunday Closing Law, but they were confronted 
with a situation which to their minds presented but two 
alternatives. One of these was to abandon any attempt 
whatever to enforce the law; the other was to enforce it 
impartially against every one. To Roosevelt it was un- 
thinkable that the Police Commissioners should permit 
the continuance of the outrageous system which had 
hitherto prevailed; and it was equally unthinkable that 
they should deliberately fail to enforce the law as it stood 
upon the statute books. There was then but one course 
left for them to pursue, and that was to close all saloons 
on Sunday without fear or favor. 

Under a recent act of Assembly the mayor had the 
power to remove the Tammany police magistrates and to 
appoint others in their places. Until this power was exer- 
cised it was idle for the Police Commissioners to attempt to 
carry out their project. As soon as Mayor Strong exercised 
the authority given him, Roosevelt prepared to act. The 
new magistrates were to take office on Monday, July 1, 
1895, and it was consequently announced that on Sunday, 
June 30th, the police would see that all liquor saloons were 
closed. The threat was carried into effect and produced a 
roar of surprise and rage throughout the length and 
breadth of Manhattan Island. The newspapers on Mon- 
day morning were full of the subject, some condemning 
the action of the Commissioners, others remaining neutral, 



110 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

and only one or two favoring it. Roosevelt himself went 
about the city to see that the order was enforced. At the 
corner of Thirtieth Street and Seventh Avenue, he was seen 
early on Sunday personally superintending the closing of a 
saloon which had violated the order. The police were 
everywhere, but the arrests were not as numerous as one 
might suppose. On January 13th, four months before the 
new Board had taken office, the arrests under the old black- 
mailing system had risen to two hundred and fifty -four. 
On the first Sunday of the new plan there were only one 
hundred and twenty-four arrests. 

Numerous attempts were made to evade the provi- 
sions of the law by furnishing a meal to thirsty patrons to 
accompany the liquor which they ordered. The meal in 
most cases consisted of nothing more substantial than 
cheese and crackers, and the evasions by this means were 
not numerous. Many went out in the harbor thinking to 
escape the attentions of the police, but this scheme had been 
foreseen by the Commissioners. The County Cork Men's 
Association, for instance, hired an excursion boat and when 
she pulled out from the dock began freely to patronize the 
bar, but policemen in plain clothes had joined the festive 
party and immediately arrested the offenders. 

In some instances the arrest of saloon-keepers who had 
been accustomed to violate the law under the old regime 
was accompanied with considerable excitement. For 
instance, John Kelly sold liquor after midnight at his 
saloon on Avenue A. An officer named Kidney knew 
what was going on and made four attempts to enter the 
place but without success. He was assisted by another 
officer named Dunne, both of them being in citizens' 
clothes. Finally five men arrived in a group and were 
admitted by the watcher at the door. Dunne tried to go 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 111 

in with them and was stopped by the watcher. During 
the wrangle a group of several hundred people collected. 
About this time Dunne noticed that Kidney had attached 
himself to another group of seven men whom the door- 
keeper seemed to know. Dunne accordingly retired and 
Kidney was admitted to the saloon. When he got inside 
Kidney found twenty-two patrons there drinking. He 
told Kelly who was behind the bar that he was under 
arrest. The watcher, who had been looking at Kidney, 
left his post, ran inside and grabbed him by the throat. 
Kidney was getting the better of it when two men inter- 
fered to help the watcher. The policeman shook himself 
free and backed up against the refrigerator, when Kelly 
and some of his friends made a rush at him. Kidney drew 
his revolver and the crowd fell back a moment. Edging 
toward the door, he pulled back the bolt and admitted 
Dunne who was all the time waiting outside. Dunne 
jumped on the nearest man and flung him into the hall. 
The next man was the watcher and Dunne threw him out 
so quickly that he did not hear Kidney shouting to him to 
hold him a prisoner. Then the two policemen having 
fairly cowed the men inside took Kelly prisoner and 
marched him to the station house. 

It seems extraordinary that the closing of the saloons 
on Sunday should have aroused such a storm of protest. 
Men who were accustomed to gratify their stomachs with 
liquor resented the slightest interference with the satis- 
faction of their appetites; and the liquor dealers, whose 
profits from Sunday sales were enormous, were of course 
not slow to raise the hue and cry against the Board of 
Police Commissioners and especially against its president. 
The question of Sunday closing immediately became a 
vital issue. On Tuesday the Young Men's Democratic 



112 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Union met and prepared to carry the agitation for a 
liberal Sunday to the Legislature in Albany. A meeting 
of German-Americans, among whom were Carl Schurz and 
Jacob H. Schiff, signed a statement advocating a liberal 
Sunday but agreeing that the Police Commissioners were 
bound by their oath of office to enforce the law as it stood. 
Roosevelt's enemies were astute and powerful and lost no 
opportunity to attack him. The liquor dealers and the 
"respectable citizens," together with the larger part of the 
daily press, began a course of persecution which only had 
the effect of confirming him in the course which he had 
chosen to follow. They were also furious with Mayor 
Strong who was alleged to have said to certain represen- 
tatives of the liquor dealers a short time before; "Boys, if 
you can arrange among yourselves, you might keep open a 
little on Sunday afternoon and see how it works," and 
who was now charged with violation of his promise. But 
the chief burden of the attack of course fell upon the 
president of the Police Board. 

On July 4th a great Tammany celebration was ad- 
dressed by ex-Governor Campbell of Ohio. In the course 
of his speech Campbell said: "The Democracy united can 
sweep this city next fall by a plurality of 70,000 votes, and 
then the time will come when persons can get their Sun- 
day beer, when a poor man who cannot afford to stable 
his horse and cart can let them stand in the street before 
his door at night." This last was an allusion to the fact 
that Roosevelt had put an end to the free stabling of horses 
and carts in the narrow streets of the city, a privilege 
which had been well paid for under the old regime. 

Roosevelt's answer to this kind of criticism was the 
plain statement: "I would rather see this administration 
turned out because it enforced the laws than see it 



POLICE COMMISSIONER US 

succeed by violating them." In his mind there was 
absolutely no room for argument. The law was there and 
it had to be enforced. 

Of the second Sunday of the crusade, July the 8th, 
one of the city newspapers reported next day, " It was dry 
but not very dry." Only one hundred and five arrests 
were made on this day for failure to comply with the law. 
Thirty citizens went to Brooklyn where the police did not 
take so strict a view of their obligations. The steamer 
Bay Queen with four barges in tow started out with a 
crowd of excursionists. Eight hundred and fifty dollars 
had been paid for the bar privilege. The newspapers 
reported that when she got well underway "the men of 
Limerick came to the barkeeper and cried aloud for 
drink and he could not minister to them." The difficulty 
of course, was that members of the police force had 
joined the excursionists to see that no violation of the law 
occurred. 

The war against Roosevelt was waged unceasingly. 
The newspapers made fun of his spectacles, his teeth, his 
volubility and above all of his recklessness* in speaking 
directly of himself in the first person singular. The com- 
mon cry was that he was the rich man's friend and the poor 
man's enemy. The president of the Young Men's Demo- 
cratic Union wrote him an open letter calling him "A 
bitter Republican with aristocratic tendencies," and asked 
him to raid the Union League Club on the following Sun- 
day. "Do not be deterred," he wrote, "from the strict 
discharge of your duty by reason of the enormous sums 
of money annually contributed to the Republican com- 
mittees 'for protection.' ' Roosevelt answered that he 
would stop unlawful sales of liquor as quickly in the 
Union League Club as in any other place, and said, "I 

8 



114 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

have seen plenty of base demagoguery in my career, but 
a baser demagoguery than that of those who protest 
against the enforcement of the law because it is against 
the poor man I have never seen." His enemies knew as 
well as he did that he was hurting not the poor man, but 
the rich liquor dealers who profited by the Sunday sales. 

The law was described as an antiquated blue law 
which no man of intelligence or liberality would attempt 
to enforce. Senator Hill, the Democratic leader of the 
state, wrote: "The chief difficulty in New York City 
today arises from the unreasonable construction which 
the new Police Commissioners and magistrates are giving 
the excise law, in their arbitrary and unintelligent enforce- 
ment of these provisions." One cartoon represented 
New York as a fair lady bound in the fetters of the blue 
laws while an unpleasant looking individual labeled 
"Puritan Reformer" looked unctuously on; another 
depicted Roosevelt sitting on Father Knickerbocker's 
lap holding a hobby-horse named Sunday Closing Law, 
while Father Knickerbocker says despairingly, "What a 
pity he doesn't cut his wisdom teeth." 

To this criticism Roosevelt made vigorous answer. 
It was idle to call a law antiquated which was only three 
years old. The Sunday closing provision had been 
inserted in the statute in 1857, but in 1892 the liquor law 
had been revised by a Democratic Legislature and the 
proposition to eliminate the Sunday provision had been 
deliberately rejected. To Hill's letter he replied that he 
was delighted as a party man to have the enforcement 
of the law made a party question, but that as an American 
citizen he was ashamed that it was possible to raise such 
an issue. 

Another charge was that the police took so much time 






POLICE COMMISSIONER 115 

in the enforcement of the Sunday Closing Law that 
they had no leisure left for the prevention of other forms 
of crime. A cartoon showed Roosevelt in a policeman's 
uniform leaning idly against a closed bar, while two 
burglars looted a safe in the rear of the premises. Below 
the picture was the statement by Roosevelt, "It is a 
waste of time for the criminal classes and their allies to 
try to distract us from enforcing the vital laws by raising 
a clamor that we are not enforcing those of less impor- 
tance." The paper in which this cartoon appeared also 
reported the complaint of a citizen whose house was 
robbed while, as he said, "The cops told me they were 
too busy to help me out." In another daily there 
appeared a list of crimes which were said to have been 
successfully perpetrated without interference or punish- 
ment by the police. Roosevelt's answer was to produce 
the facts and to prove by the police records that the 
average number of felonies was one less per day than 
during the preceding year and that the average of arrests 
was one more per day. He took up the cases of crime of 
which the newspaper had complained and showed by 
means of the deadly parallel what the exact truth was. 
In one column he put the statements made by his enemies 
and in the other the reports of the cases as they appeared 
in the records of his department. In every case the 
accusations were proven to be unfounded. 

His enemies became considerably disturbed because 
the law was not enforced as strictly against the sellers of 
soda water as against the retailers of liquor. "It wasn't 
very dry," reported one of the newspapers after the 
third Sunday of the campaign. Soda was purchased 
quite readily and there was apparently little effort to 
prevent its sale, although the law covers soft drinks as 



116 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

well as alcoholic ones. Roosevelt retorted that it was 
impossible with the force at his command to compel 
obedience to every provision of the law; that he would do 
so as far as lay in his power, and that the enforcement of the 
more important provisions of the law necessarily would 
have the priority. He was determined to stamp out 
the Sunday sales of liquor because they had been in the 
past a source of blackmail and corruption. "If," he 
said, "a policeman finds a penny gambling game on one 
side of the street and a burglar on the other, I should not 
expect him to risk the escape of the burglar through his 
anxiety to arrest the gamblers." 

As the crusade went on, the press became more and 
more openly hostile. It was computed that the saloon 
keepers were losing every Sunday the profit on the sale 
of 30,000 kegs of beer, and this fact no doubt influenced 
the policy of the newspapers in which they advertised. 
New York was described in the Monday morning editions 
as "Roosevelt's Deserted Village," and was frequently 
likened to the Desert of Sahara. 

At intervals, violent conflicts occurred over the 
enforcement of the law, such as the fight of the first night 
between Kidney and Kelly. One saloon-keeper who 
stood high in political circles was known as "King" or 
"Bootsy" Callahan. When the campaign began, a 
patrolman named Edward J. Bourke was walking for 
the first time the beat on which Callahan's saloon was 
situated. After midnight the saloon was still running 
at full blast and Bourke stepping inside told Callahan 
to close up. Then he walked around the block and put 
his head in again to see if his order had been obeyed. 
Callahan resented this kind of persistence and went so 
far as to knock Bourke down. Bourke instantly got to 



POLICE COMMISSIONER 117 

his feet and knocked Callahan down. They grappled, 
and as they rolled on the floor, Callahan's friends did 
their best to stamp on Bourke. Bourke, however, stuck 
to his job and finally shut the saloon and ran his man 
into the police station. The next morning Callahan's 
friends had the cards stacked against the policeman and 
were prepared not only to procure Callahan's release, but 
to charge Bourke with improper conduct in attempting 
to make an arrest. Fortunately, Roosevelt heard of the 
matter and started for the court-room. His appearance 
put a veiy different face on the situation and the result 
was a triumphant victory for Bourke and for the new 
system. 

By this time the matter of Sunday closing had become 
so much of a political issue that Republicans and Demo- 
crats alike were trying to make capital out of it at one 
another's expense. The idea that each community 
should decide the question for itself was advocated by 
many and attained considerable popularity. Roosevelt, 
however, was not interested in this phase of the matter. 
He was only concerned in enforcing the law as it stood 
and in discharging the sworn duties of his office. His 
attitude brought him many enemies, but friends were not 
wanting. 

In a great meeting in Carnegie Hall in August 
he spoke before the Catholic Total Abstinence Union of 
America and received a tremendous ovation. Resolu- 
tions were adopted approving the course which he had 
pursued. 

At last the liquor men concluded that neither 
threats nor ridicule would swerve the Commissioners 
from their task. On September 5th at a meeting of the 
Liquor Dealers' Association, a resolution was adopted 



118 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

calling for the voluntary closing of the saloons on Sunday. 
This did not mean that all the trouble ceased; but a new 
step had been taken and things never slipped back to 
anything like they had been before. 

Roosevelt's record as Police Commissioner, and espe- 
cially his uncompromising and determined enforcement of 
the Sunday Closing Law stood him in good stead when, 
less than two years later, he made his successful campaign 
for the Governorship. 



CHAPTER VIII 

Assistant Secretary of the Navy 

ROOSEVELT became Assistant Secretary of the 
Navy in April, 1897. Following the Civil War, 
" the Nation had put away armaments and taken 
up happily the pursuits of peace. Weary of the financial 
burden of fleets and armies, and self-complacent in the 
security of the Monroe Doctrine and the belief that war 
with any foreign power was beyond the range of possi- 
bility, the government acquiesced in the general demand 
for disarmament. Consequently, the development in the 
science of naval warfare which had flourished during the 
days of the Rebellion ceased altogether, and for a long 
time there was no thought of naval reconstruction in 
consonance with the maritime evolution of the period. 
For two decades in the last half of the nineteenth century 
we had not a single armored ship. In the administra- 
tion of President Hayes our navy ranked lower than that 
of any nation in Europe. Chili, with her two ironclads, 
was stronger on the sea than we were. During the admin- 
istration of President Garfield twenty-five out of one 
hundred and forty vessels in our navy were ordinary 
sea tugs. Not a single ship was in condition for warfare. 
All were wooden ships; they included the side-wheel 
steamer Powhatan, and the very ancient frigate, Consti- 
tution. The mounts of these wooden tubs were smooth- 
bores — "left-overs" from the Civil War. 

Then, under President Arthur, came the awakening. 
The first program of the new era called for thirty-eight 

(119) 



120 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

unarmored cruisers, five rams, five torpedo gunboats 
and ten harbor torpedo-boats, mostly of steel. Following 
it came the celebrated "White Squadron." Next the 
government encouraged the creation of industries for the 
manufacture of guns, forgings and castings that formerly 
had been bought abroad. Finally, in 1890, the first 
American battleships were laid down. Thus when Roose- 
velt became Assistant Secretary, the condition of our navy 
was far better than it had been fifteen years before, when 
he wrote his "Naval History of the War of 1812." 

On the other hand, our navy was not prepared for war. 
Of this he was fully aware, and he devoted all his energy 
and force to making the navy ready, for he made no 
secret of his firm conviction that affairs in Cuba were in 
such a precarious state that intervention in the island by 
the United States would be necessary. Furthermore, he 
believed that it was the moral duty of the United States 
to end Spanish misrule in Cuba and to stop at once and 
forever the despotic tyranny of the Spanish Governor- 
General, Weyler, the shooting of unarmed men and 
women, and the herding of thousands of reconcentrados 
(country people forced to leave their homes) into camps 
and garrisoned towns. 

He made no pretense of concealing his own views, 
though it was currently believed in Washington at the 
time that his desire to speed up a war program was not 
shared by his chief The Secretary of the Navy, who 
had been president of the Massachusetts Peace Society, 
was perhaps inclined to view the activities of his assistant 
as those of a youthful zealot. But Roosevelt, eager to 
have the department placed upon a basis of prepared- 
ness, sought frequent audience with President McKinley. 
Washington told of a certain carriage ride along the Poto- 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 121 

mac when "the rattle of the wheels and the jangle of the 
harness was completely drowned out by the flow of con- 
versation that came from the interior of the brougham.'* 
The ride may be the creation of a reporter's brain but the 
story, like a good caricature, contains an essential truth. 
The President was striving to avert war; the Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy was striving to prepare the navy 
for the war that he deemed imminent. 

In a Cabinet meeting to which he was summoned one 
day in March, 1898, he is reported to have replied to some 
statement of a Cabinet officer: "The coming war — don't 
speak to me about the coming war, it's here. It's been 
war for six weeks and we have lost one of our battleships." 

He believed the blowing up of the Maine had forced 
the issue: he believed the people were ardently for war 
with Spain, and that they were right. Some of the mem- 
bers of the President's Cabinet held out for peace, others 
had formed no definite conclusion, and the President him- 
self was still deliberating on what course to pursue. But 
not the Assistant Secretary of the Navy. He had a work- 
ing plan for the conduct of the war, and, furthermore, he 
submitted it. 

"When the President learned that Mr. Roosevelt had 
formed a definite opinion about what the situation de- 
manded," says Francis E. Leupp in "The Man Roose- 
velt," "he sent for him one morning and listened to his 
plans. When the question was discussed in the Cabinet 
the same day, the President remarked with a smile, 'Gen- 
tlemen, not one of you has put half as much enthu- 
siasm into his expression as Mr. Roosevelt, our Assistant 
Secretary of the Navy. He has laid out the whole pro- 
gramme of the war.' 

" 'Could you not induce him to work out a written 



122 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

report as a model for us?' queried one of the members of 
the Cabinet in the same tone as that of the President. 

"'I can do better than that,' replied President McKin- 
ley, 'I can call him in and let you hear for yourselves." 

It is related that Roosevelt accepted the invitation 
and in vigorous style, after the President had given him a 
few leading questions, ran through his programme, while 
every Cabinet officer listened intently. He put more 
enthusiasm in it, with facile expression and gesture, than 
the President had been able to give in his first report. 
When he left, the President smiled. A few of his Cabinet 
members smiled too, and there were still others who could 
find nothing impressive in what they were pleased to 
regard as "radicalism" and "exaggeration" and "enthu- 
siasm." But Washington rang with the story that night 
and for some days afterward. 

At the time of the sinking of the Maine our navy 
consisted of ninety vessels. Twenty-one of these were 
unserviceable, twenty-seven were out of commission and 
forty-two were in commission. Of those in commission, 
six were in the East Indies, eight on the coast of Africa, 
seven on the Pacific coast, twelve in home ports, three on 
the European station and six in South Atlantic waters. 
Had she struck at that moment Spain might have accom- 
plished mischief. But, just as Great Britain marshaled 
her fleet in the North Sea in the summer of 1914, so the 
Navy Department, in the winter of 1898, began calling 
our navy home. Roosevelt had a prominent and all- 
important part in that mobilization. 

The buying of new ships and the conversion of mer- 
chant marine into men-of-war devolved largely upon the 
Assistant Secretary. With consummate zeal he set about 
the task. Congress first voted $50,000,000 for war pur- 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 123 

poses, of which more than half went to the navy. Later 
the navy received more than $57,000,000 in all. Roosevelt 
sent Captain W. H. Brownson abroad to buy ships. But 
foreign nations were averse to any entanglements with a 
belligerent growing out of the disposition of ships of war 
and were loath to sell. However, he did succeed in get- 
ting the cruisers Ama2ones and Abreu from Brazil, the gun- 
boat Diogenes from England and two torpedo-boats. In 
quick succession ninety-seven merchantmen were pur- 
chased at home and transformed into auxiliary cruisers, 
gunboats and colliers. Fifteen revenue cutters, four 
lighthouse tenders and two U. S. Fish Commission vessels 
were pressed into service. 

Not the least of Roosevelt's troubles was the profiteer. 
One of the great needs of the hour was coaling vessels. 
And of these, "many were called but few were chosen." 
They were rejected in part because of their unseaworthy 
condition. In spite of the exercise of his best care and 
judgment he frequently found vessels wished upon the 
navy by designing agents which looked all right in port 
but not in the open sea laden with a full cargo. He pro- 
tested against the exorbitant prices asked, and the inferior 
bottoms offered. But the government had to have the 
ships and he found himself frequently in a dilemma. Mr. 
Leupp records a striking instance of the way he vented his 
wrath upon the "profiteers." 

" I burst in upon him one day at the department, with- 
out warning, and found him in the middle of the floor 
indulging in some very spirited talk to a visitor. As I was 
hastily withdrawing he called me back. 

'"Stay here,' said he, 'I want to see you.' Then he 
turned very abruptly from me and again faced the third 
party, in whom I recognized, as the light fell on his face, 



124 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

a lawyer of some prominence and an officeholder under 
a previous administration. Mr. Roosevelt's teeth were 
set, and very much in evidence, in the peculiar way they 
always are when he is angry. His spectacle lenses seemed 
to throw off electric sparks as his head moved quickly this 
way and that in speaking; and his right fist came down 
from time to time upon the opposite palm as if it were an 
adversary's face. And this was about the way he delivered 
himself: 

' ' Don't you feel ashamed to come to me today with 
another offer after what you did yesterday? Don't you 
think that to sell one rotten ship to the government is 
enough for a single week? Are you in such a hurry that 
you couldn't wait even over Sunday to force your dam- 
aged goods upon the United States? Is it an excess of 
patriotism that brings you here day after day, in this way, 
or only your realization of our necessities?' 

" ' Why, our clients* — began the lawyer. 

"'Yes, I know all about your clients,' burst in the 
Assistant Secretary. T congratulate them on having an 
attorney who will do work for them which they wouldn't 
have the face to do for themselves. I should think, after 
having enjoyed the honors that you have had at the hands 
of the government, you'd feel a keen pride in your present 
occupation ! No, I don't want any more of your old tubs. 
The one I bought yesterday is good for nothing except to 
sink somewhere in the path of the enemy's fleet. It will 
be God's mercy if she doesn't go down with brave men 
on her — men who go to war and risk their lives, instead 
of staying home to sell rotten hulks to the government!' 

"The air of the attorney as he bowed himself out was 
almost pitiable. The special glint did not fade from Mr. 
Roosevelt's glasses, nor did his jaw relax or his fist unclinch 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 125 

till the door closed on the retreating figure. Then his face 
lighted with a smile as he advanced to greet me. 

"'You came just in time,' he cried. 'I wanted you to 
hear what I had to say to that fellow; not' — and here his 
voice rose on the high falsetto wave which is always a sign 
that he is enjoying an idea while framing it in words — 
'not that it would add materially to the sum of your pleas- 
ure, but that it would humiliate him to have any one 
present while I gave him his punishment. It is the only 
means I have of getting even.' " 

Everywhere the lack of ships and materials and facil- 
ities crossed the path of the Assistant Secretary. He, 
however, cut through red tape, disregarded the conven- 
tions of the department and, upon his own initiative, 
proceeded with the task of making ready. Not content 
with speeding up manufacturing processes at home he 
went into foreign markets to procure munitions and sup- 
plies. Upon one occasion he ordered from Great Britain 
a shipload of smokeless powder. Ten days after the 
order had been given a big steamship appeared off the 
Maine coast. She was reported as a derelict. United 
States sailors were sent to board her, and they found the 
English crew had left her drifting with her cargo. She 
was taken to the Boston yard where the ammunition was 
unloaded. A short time later, after the war began, Sen- 
ator Gorman, of Maryland, a member of the Naval 
Committee, called upon President McKinley and urged 
that restrictions be placed upon authority to order muni- 
tions, incidentally using Mr. Roosevelt's action as an 
argument. 

With a smile, President McKinley, who had just 
received the resignation of the Assistant Secretary of the 
Navy, with the announcement that he was going into 



126 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the army, answered the irate Senator: "Mr. Roosevelt 
retires today to go to the front." 

In connection with his efforts to buy ships Roosevelt 
himself related the following story: "One day in the 
spring of 1898, when it fell to my lot to get the navy ready 
for war, I and my naval aid, Lieutenant Sharpe, went 
out to buy auxiliary cruisers. On this particular day we 
had spent about $7,000,000. It began to rain. 'Sharpe,' 
I said, 'I have only four cents in my pocket. Lend me a 
cent or five cents, will you, so that I can ride home?' 
Sharp answered: 'I haven't a single cent,' and I answered 
him, 'Never mind, Sharp, that's why we will beat the 
Spaniards! It isn't every country where two public serv- 
ants could spend $7,000,000 and not have a cent in their 
pockets after they are through." 

Facilities for taking care of the ships in the navy were 
so poor that at one time in 1897 the battleship Indiana 
had to be sent to Halifax to have the bottom scraped and 
cleaned. On the score of ammunition the Assistant Sec- 
retary made the remarkable discovery, when he came 
into the department in 1897, that nine shots for each 
ship were to serve for a year's target practice ! Appropria- 
tions for naval target practice had been utterly ridicu- 
lous. "Regulations for target practice, issued on June 
22, 1897," says John R. Spears in "The History of our 
Navy," provided that each gun of a caliber of ten inches 
or greater should be fired once with a full service charge, 
and eight times with a reduced charge every — well, now, 
in what period of time does the uninformed reader sup- 
pose? Every month, in order to make our man behind 
the gun the most skilful in the world? That would be 
a reasonable guess, but those nine shots were to serve for 
a year's target-practice! .... Even the guns of 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 127 

the rapid-fire batteries of four-inch and five-inch caliber 
which we were to use in repelling a torpedo-boat destroyer 
later on, were to be fired but twenty-five times a year. 
But Roosevelt changed all that. The pop and roar of 
target-practice made the welkin ring the whole day long 
where the ships of our squadron lay." 

Although the relations between Secretary Long and 
his assistant were of the most pleasant nature, the two 
executives proceeded along different lines of action. 
While Long remained conservative and cautious Roose- 
velt forged ahead on an ambitious scale that kept em- 
ployees of the department, heads of bureaus and naval 
officers asking, " What next?" The difference in the heads 
of the Navy Department can be aptly illustrated by two 
stories that have come to my attention. 

When the Maine was blown up, hot indignation raged 
in the hearts of many naval officers. Among this number 
was "Fighting Bob" (Robley D.) Evans, who, in a few 
months, was to gain undying fame at Santiago. Evans, 
a few days after the Maine disaster, said to Secretary 
Long: 

"If I had been in Admiral Sicard's (then leader of the 
North Atlantic squadron) place I would have taken my 
entire squadron into Havana harbor next morning, and 
then I would have said to them, 'Now, we'll investigate 
this matter, and let you know what we think of it at once.' 

"If you had done that," the Secretary is recorded as 
having replied, "you would have been recalled and 
severely reprimanded." 

"I don't doubt that, sir:" "Fighting Bob" replied, 
"but the people would have made me President at the 
next election." 

Contrast the modus operandi of the Roosevelt 



128 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

brain! One day during the early part of his tenure of 
office in the Navy Department a high officer of the navy, 
noted for his knowledge of nautical technique, walked into 
Mr. Roosevelt's office and, in the course of a conversa- 
tion, remarked, in an absent-minded sort of way: 

"I certainly think the gunboat Annapolis should be 
barkantine rigged." 

Mr. Roosevelt, with his customary vigor, and perhaps 
recognizing the other's superior knowledge of naval mat- 
ters, impulsively jumped up from the chair, banged his 
fist on his desk and cried : 

"Why, of course she should, Admiral. Of course she 
should. I'll see that it is done." 

Taking his cue from the Admiral, the Assistant Sec- 
retary sat down at once and dictated a score of letters to 
naval constructors and naval officers asking their views 
on the matter. When the replies to the questionnaire were 
all in, Mr. Roosevelt sent for the chief constructor. "I 
have here," he said, "about twenty letters from some of 
the best men in the navy, and every one of them says 
he thinks the gunboat Annapolis should be barkantine 
rigged." 

"I think so, too,' ' said the constructor. 

"Then why isn't she barkantine rigged?" demanded 
Mr. Roosevelt with some heat. 

And forthwith the Annapolis was barkantine rigged! 

The alarmists were busy when the news came from the 
Cape Verde Islands that the Spanish fleet was headed 
across the Atlantic. The agitation resulted in changing 
some of the navy's plans. Mobilization of our fleets had 
begun in January, when the battleship Maine was ordered 
to Havana. The North Atlantic squadron was sent to the 
Florida drill grounds loaded with ammunition and ordered 



Vi 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 129 

to engage in daily target practice. Vessels in European 
station were ordered home. The South Atlantic squadron 
was ordered from Brazil to Key West. The Nation's naval 
resources were mobilized within ninety miles of Cuba and 
held ready for a surprise attack. But in the meantime the 
cry for protection of the Atlantic coast was raised in many 
quarters just as it developed after our entry into the 
world war and the alarmists felt apprehensive over possible 
German submarine attacks. Roosevelt helped dispel 
these fears by assisting Secretary Long in the organi- 
zation of a "Flying Squadron" to be maneuvered in 
defense of the Atlantic coast cities, and still another 
northern patrol fleet for service off the Middle Atlantic 
and New England coasts. Roosevelt regarded the send- 
ing of the Spanish fleet to Cuba as a cause of war, and 
approved of sending a squadron to it without waiting for 
a more formal declaration of war. Mr. Leupp gives the 
following account of a characteristic conversation: 

"One Sunday morning in March, 1898, we were 
sitting in his library discussing the significance of the 
news that Cervera's squadron was about to sail for 
Cuba, when he suddenly arose and brought his hands 
together with a resounding clap. 

"If I could do what I pleased,' he exclaimed, 'I would 
send Spain notice today that we should consider her 
despatch of that squadron a hostile act. Then, if she 
didn't heed the warning, she would have to take the con- 
sequences.' 

'You are sure,' I asked, 'that it is with unfriendly 
intent that she is sending her squadron?' 

'What else can it be? The Cubans have no navy; 
therefore the squadron can not be coming to fight the 
insurgents. The only naval power interested in Cuban 



130 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

affairs is the United States. Spain is simply forestalling 
the "brush" which she knows, as we do, is coming sooner 
or later.' 

"'And if she refused to withdraw the orders to 
Cervera?' 

"'I should send out a squadron to meet his on the 
high seas and smash it ! Then I would force the fighting 
from that day to the end of the war.' ' ' 

Even after Cervera's squadron was cornered in the 
harbor of Santiago there were many who held that the 
impending clash with the Spanish ships would be a minor 
matter, in so far as the strategic conduct of the war was 
concerned; that the decisive conflict would be fought on 
land in the vicinity of Havana. Roosevelt knew that 
the fleet had put into Santiago without coal instead of 
proceeding to Cienfuegos where it would be in rail contact 
with Havana. He figured that the squadron of Cervera 
must eventually make a break for liberty and take its 
chances with the American fleet on guard, and he reasoned 
that the small Spanish army in the vicinity of Santiago, 
shut off from reinforcements by the lack of rail connec- 
tion with Havana, would first be defeated by General 
Shafter's troops. With the army defeated he had no 
doubt as to the fleet's inability to stand up before the 
American navy. How well he reasoned in the matter was 
proved by subsequent events. His deductions were borne 
out in realistic detail ! 

This subtle knack of anticipating the enemy was 
characteristic. During all the time that he was aiding in 
the preparation of the navy for the task in hand, and 
months before the sinking of the Maine he pointed out 
that the twin theaters of the war would be the West 
Indies and the far Philippines. Examination of the 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 131 

records shows that the far-sighted steps taken by the Navy 
Department in planting coaling stations, supply depots 
and maintaining warships at strategic points, contributed 
valuably to the splendid victory of Dewey at Manila. 
Roosevelt had coal at Hong Kong. He sent colliers into 
the Pacific and bought other vessels to carry supplies. 
It was his order that turned back the Olympia, Dewey's 
flagship at Manila, when it was headed for the Mare Island 
Navy Yard, to the far Pacific station in the Yellow Sea. 
It was due in great measure to his sagacity that the 
cruiser Baltimore arrived at Hong Kong just in time to 
join Dewey and depart with the flotilla for Manila after 
the Chinese authorities had proclaimed the neutrality of 
the port. 

Roosevelt was a staunch supporter of Dewey. He 
stood solidly for his retention when high naval officials 
and politicians were urging the selection of another leader 
for the Pacific fleet. San Francisco and a few other 
western cities objected to the selection of Dewey. They 
had in mind a "favorite son." But Roosevelt stood to his 
guns. One day a delegation called upon him to protest 
against the Dewey appointment. Roosevelt heard them 
through and then answered them rather vehemently : 

"Gentlemen, I can't agree with you. We have looked 
up his record. We have looked him straight in the eyes. 
He is a fighter. We'll not change now. Pleased to have 
met you. Good-day, gentlemen." 

For a time there was the suggestion of a controversy 
as to who had sent the message to Admiral Dewey direct- 
ing him to proceed to Manila and destroy the Spanish 
fleet. It was Secretary Long who, on April 24, 1898, sent 
the following message to Dewey at Hong Kong: 

"War has commenced between the United States and 



132 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Spain. Proceed at once to the Philippine Islands. 
Begin operations at once, particularly against the Span- 
ish fleet. You must capture vessels or destroy. Use 
utmost endeavors." 

It was Roosevelt, however, who did more than any one 
else in the department to enable Dewey to have his fleet 
on edge for a conflict that was to signalize to the whole 
world the prowess of the new American navy. On February 
25th, just after the destruction of the Maine at Havana, 
and more than two months before Dewey's fleet defied 
Cavite and bearded the " Dons" in their Philippine den, the 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy sent the following message: 

"Secret and confidential. Order the squadron, except 
the Monocacy, to Hong Kong. Keep full of coal. In 
the event of declaration of war with Spain your duty 
will be to see that the Spanish squadron does not leave 
the Asiatic coast, and then offensive operations in the 
Philippine Islands. (Signed) Roosevelt." 

When the Navy Department ordered the Olympia 
home, it was Roosevelt who interceded and had the order 
revoked. He then sent this cablegram to Dewey: 

"Keep the Olympia. Provide yourself with coal." 

The coal ! It was Roosevelt who thus kept ready the 
essential supplies so that the ships might move when the 
time came. As against this policy of preparedness we may 
compare the policy of the Spanish Admiralty in ordering 
Cervera to sea without advance preparations for coaling 
his fleet. Had Cervera had coal he might have made 
Cienf uegos, to which point the bulk of the Spanish army of 
twenty thousand in the vicinity of Havana might have been 
transported. For lack of it, Cervera put into Santiago, at 
which point occurred the final disaster to Spanish arms. 

Secretary Long, in spite of rumors to the contrary, had 



ASSISTANT SECRETARY OF NAVY 133 

a distinct admiration for Roosevelt, though he by no 
means always agreed with him. Their points of view and 
temperaments were as wide apart as the poles. The Sec- 
retary was not a man to "start something" every fifteen 
minutes; Roosevelt was. Writing some time after the 
war, Mr. Long, in recounting Roosevelt's connection with 
and work in the department, says : 

"His activity was characteristic. He was zealous in 
the work of putting the navy in condition for the appre- 
hended struggle. His ardor sometimes went faster than 
the President or the department approved. . . . 
He worked indefatigably, frequently incorporating his 
views in memoranda which he would place every morning 
on my desk. Most of his suggestions had, however, so far 
as applicable, been already adopted by the various bureaus 
the chiefs of which were straining every nerve and leaving 
nothing undone. When I suggested to him that some 
future historian reading his memoranda, if they were put 
on record, would get the impression that the bureaus 
were inefficient, he accepted the suggestion with the 
generous good nature which is so marked in him. Indeed, 
nothing could be pleasanter than our relations. He was 
heart and soul in his work. His typewriters had no rest. 
He, like most of us, lacks the rare knack of brevity. He 
was especially stimulating to the younger officers who gath- 
ered about him, and made his office as busy as a hive. He 
was especially helpful in the purchasing of ships and in every 
line where he could push on the work of preparation for war. ' ' 

Somewhat hesitating praise, perhaps, but enough to 
show that the country was right in its belief that it owed 
much that had been done in the year preceding the Span- 
ish War to the far-sightedness, energy and ability of the 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy. 



CHAPTER IX 

Colonel of the Rough Riders 

A FEW weeks after the outbreak of the war with 
Spain, Mr. William Potter, of Philadelphia, form- 
erly the United States Ambassador to Italy, 
called on the Assistant Secretary of the Navy at his office 
in Washington. Roosevelt said: 

"I leave for the front tomorrow. Everybody in 
Washington whose opinion I respect, the President, the 
Secretary, and even Mrs. Roosevelt, think I can be of 
more service by remaining at my post in the Navy 
Department, but I have always said if my country ever 
engaged in war, I should take part, so I am going off 
tomorrow." 

He believed that as he had preached with all the 
fervor and zeal he possessed our duty to intervene in 
Cuba, now that war had come to drive the Spaniard from 
the western world it was incumbent on him to take an 
active part in it, not in Washington, but at the front. 
Even before war was declared, he and his friend, Doctor, 
now General, Leonard Wood, had been planning how to 
get to the front when war came. Roosevelt's first 
effort, which was to secure a position in a New York 
regiment, failed. Then the provision in the act of 
Congress providing for three cavalry regiments to be 
recruited in all parts of the United States gave him his 
opportunity. Leonard Wood was the physician of the 
Secretary of War, Russell Alexander Alger. As the one 
member of the Cabinet who always believed that war 

(134) 




0-p O a) 

n i- » 




COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 135 

with Spain was inevitable, the Secretary had always 
sympathized with Roosevelt's point of view. It was 
therefore not a difficult matter for him to persuade the 
Secretary that Wood should be appointed colonel, and 
himself lieutenant-colonel of the "First United States 
Volunteer Cavalry." Indeed, Roosevelt might have 
secured the colonelcy for himself, making Wood lieu- 
tenant-colonel, but he wisely determined that he had 
not as yet sufficient experience to command a regiment. 

Colonel Wood at once devoted all his time to recruiting 
the regiment and securing the necessary supplies, the 
latter, in view of the entire unreadiness of the War 
Department for war, a most difficult undertaking. Wood 
preceded Roosevelt to San Antonio, the place selected 
for the mobilization of the regiment, Roosevelt remaining 
in Washington to finish his work at the Navy Department. 
Indeed, he did not resign as Assistant Secretary until 
May 6th. His chief, Secretary Long, has left us an inter- 
esting picture of this period of transition from one branch 
of the service to another: 

"His (Roosevelt's) room in the Navy Department, 
after his decision to enter the army, which preceded by 
some time his resignation as Assistant Secretary of the 
Navy, was an interesting scene. It bubbled over with 
enthusiasm and was filled with bright young fellows from 
all over the country, college graduates and old associates 
from the western ranches, all eager to serve Roosevelt. 
The Rough Rider uniform was in evidence; it filled the 
corridors — guns, uniforms, all sorts of military traps, and 
piles of paper littered the Assistant Secretary's room, 
but it was all the very inspiration of young manhood." 

When it was announced that Wood and Roosevelt 
were organizing a cavalry regiment, telegrams poured in 



136 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

from men all over the country who were eager to join it. 
They could have raised a brigade, as far as men were 
concerned, without the slightest trouble. From the fact 
that many cowboys and other "rough-and-ready West- 
erners" were accepted, the regiment became known in 
the army and by the people as the "Rough Riders" — a 
term taken from the slang of the circus. Its colonels did 
not relish the title at first, but it "stuck," and, like many 
another term applied in humor or derision, it became a 
title of honor. It was made up of the greatest variety 
of men, with the strongest contrasts possible to bring 
together. Roosevelt, in his book, "The Rough Riders," 
has described its paradoxical make-up: 

"We drew recruits from Harvard, Yale, Princeton 
and many another college; from clubs like the Somerset 
of Boston, and Knickerbocker of New York; and from 
among the men who belonged neither to club nor to 
college. Four of the policemen who had served under 
me while I was president of the New York Police Board 
insisted on coming. It seemed to me that almost every 
friend I had in every state had some one acquaintance 
who was bound to go with the Rough Riders, and for 
whom I had to make a place. 

"Harvard being my own college, I had such a swarm 
of applications from it that I could not take one in 
ten. They did not ask for commissions. With hardly 
an exception they entered upon their duties as troopers 
in the spirit which they held to the end. Not a man of 
them backed out; not one of them failed to do his duty. 

"Then I went down to San Antonio, where Wood 
preceded me, and found the men from New Mexico, 
Arizona, and Oklahoma already gathered, while those 
from Indian Territory came in soon after my arrival. 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 137 

"All — Easterners and Westerners, Northerners and 
Southerners, officers and men, cow boys and college 
graduates, wherever they came from, whatever their 
social position — possessed in common the traits of hardi- 
hood and a thirst for adventure. They were to a man 
born adventurers, in the old sense of the word. Some 
of them went by their own names; some had changed 
their names; and yet others possessed but half a name, 
colored by some adjective, like Cherokee Bill, Happy 
Jack of Arizona, Smoky Moore, the broncho-buster, and 
Rattlesnake Pete. Some were professional gamblers, and 
on the other hand, no less than four had been or were 
Baptist or Methodist clergymen — and proved first-class 
fighters, by the way. 

"From the Indian Territory there came a number of 
Indians — Cherokees, Chickasaws, Choctaws and Creeks. 
One of the gamest and best fighters of the regiment was 
Pollock, a full-blooded Pawnee. Another Indian came 
from Texas. His name was Colbert; he was an excellent 
man, and a descendant of the old Chickasaw chiefs. 

"There were men who had won fame as Rocky 
Mountain stage-drivers, or who had spent endless days 
guiding the slow wagon-trains across the grassy plains. 
There were miners who knew every camp from the 
Yukon to Leadville, and cow-punchers in whose mem- 
ories were stored the brands carried by the herds from 
Chihuahua to Assinaboid." 

Also there was a North Carolina mountaineer who 
had hunted "moonshiners," a bear-hunter from Wyom- 
ing, and a big buffalo-hunter. One "high private" had 
been chief of scouts in the Kiel Rebellion, in the wild 
northwestern region of Canada, and there was a famous 
broncho-buster named McGinty, who could not march in 



138 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

step because he had spent most of his life on horseback. 
He said if he had a horse he could make it march all right. 
There was an Italian trumpeter who had seen service in 
Egypt and southern China. Of their names among 
themselves, their Colonel added: 

"The men speedily gave one another nicknames, 
largely conferred in a spirit of derision, their basis lying 
in contrast. A brave but fastidious member of a well- 
known eastern club, who was serving in the ranks, was 
christened 'Tough Ike;' and his bunkie, the man who 
shared his shelter-tent, who was a decidedly rough cow- 
puncher, gradually acquired the name of 'The Dude.' 
One unlucky and simple-minded cow-puncher, who had 
never been east of the great plains in his life, unwarily 
boasted that he had an aunt in New York, and ever 
afterward went by the name of 'Metropolitan Bill.' 
A huge, red-headed Irishman was named 'Sheeny Solo- 
mon.' A young Jew who developed into one of the best 
fighters in the regiment, accepted, with entire equanimity, 
the name of 'Pork-chop.' We had quite a number of 
professional gamblers, who, I am bound to say, usually 
made good soldiers. One, who was almost abnormally 
quiet and gentle, was called 'Hell Roarer; ' while another, 
who, in point of language and deportment, was his exact 
opposite, was christened 'Prayerful James.' : 

"Embarrassment of riches" was the greatest problem 
confronting the two colonels of the First Volunteer 
Cavalry. The question was not whom to accept, but 
whom to reject. The Rough Riders came together 
through the evolutionary process of "natural selection" 
and "survival of the fittest" — -to fight, for they were 
a nondescript company of born fighters and fighters by 
preference and training. 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 139 

When the regiment was complete — up to the increased 
quota of one thousand men — its leading officers found 
that their troubles were only beginning — not on account 
of the men, however, but because of the delays in trans- 
portation and the improvident, if not absolutely corrupt, 
commissary conditions. 

On the 29th of May, 1898, they were enabled to 
leave San Antonio, Texas, for Tampa, Florida, where 
they were to embark for Cuba. They spent four hot 
days and humid nights on the way. Colonel Roosevelt, 
in order to see that his men were made as comfortable as 
possible, waited for the seventh and last train. Then 
he rode in a dirty old ramshackle day-coach, which 
was overcrowded and uncomfortable, because he had 
given his sleeping-car berth to a sick soldier. The 
rations issued, bad as they were, proved insufficient 
before they reached their port of embarkation. The 
Rough Riders had already appealed to the heart of the 
country — especially in hospitable, chivalrous Dixie — so 
that their trains were greeted by cheering crowds, and 
pretty girls met the boys at the stations, swapping 
bouquets for brass buttons, until the soldiers hardly had 
the necessary complement left. Their uniforms were a 
novelty, in America, at least, with the broad-brimmed 
hats and "dust-colored" suits. Uniforms of that hue 
were first worn by British soldiers in India — the word for 
dusty in the Hindoo speech being khaki. The British 
Indian "khaki" was afterward modified to olive green. 
When they finally reached Tampa, they found every- 
thing in confusion. After wasting nearly a week it was 
suddenly announced that they were to sail from Port 
Tampa, nine miles away, early the next day. Trains 
were supposed to be provided, but as they did not 



140 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

materialize, the two colonels and their men took pos- 
session of some empty coal cars and "by various means" 
not stated, induced the engineer to back down to Tampa, 
where they arrived covered with coal dust, but with all 
their belongings and before the hour named for departure. 
The wharf was jammed with over 10,000 troops. No 
one seemed to know which troops were to go upon any 
particular transport. When they finally were assigned a 
transport, the Yucatan, Roosevelt discovered that the 
same ship had been assigned to two other regiments, one 
of which was sufficient to fill the vessel to overflowing. 
Accordingly he ran at full speed back to the coal train, 
double-quicked the men on to the wharf, and had them 
take possession of the vessel the moment it touched the 
wharf. In this case, possession was eleven points of the 
law. The men were packed like sardines — hot, steaming 
and uncomfortable, but they would have reconciled them- 
selves to anything for the sake of getting into the fight. 

Next day they received word that the vessels were 
not to sail, but await further orders. 

There followed a delay of nearly a week in their 
cramped quarters, Colonel Roosevelt tells us that "The 
travel rations which had been issued to the men for the 
voyage were insufficient, because the meat was very bad 
indeed; and when a ration consists of only four or five 
items, which, taken together, just meet the requirements 
of a strong and healthy man, the loss of one item is a 
serious thing. If we had been given canned corn-beef, 
we would have been all right, but instead of this, the 
soldiers were issued horrible stuff called 'canned fresh 
beef/ There was no salt in it. At the best, it was 
stringy and tasteless; at the worst it was nauseating. 
Not one-fourth of it was ever eaten at all, even when the 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 141 

men became very hungry. There were no facilities for 
the men to cook anything. There was no ice for them; 
the water was not good; and they had no fresh meat or 
fresh vegetables." 

Finally the transport started. Sailing southward and 
east along the northern shore of Cuba, they rounded its 
eastern end and disembarked at Daiquiri, near the 
entrance to the harbor of Santiago de Cuba. The officers 
were permitted to bring their horses. Colonel Roosevelt 
brought two — "Texas" and "Rain-in-the-Face." In 
swimming ashore, "Rain-in-the-Face" was drowned. 

The landing was effected under the protection of a 
heavy bombardment from American warships. Accord- 
ing to a red-tape regulation by which uniforms for winter 
were issued in summer, the men received winter clothing 
for a midsummer campaign in the tropics. Their woolen 
clothing added to the horrors of the almost-equatorial 
sun and the daily downpour of warm rains. Throwing 
away their garments like a routed army, they trudged 
wearily back from the coast toward the town of Santiago. 
The regular foot-soldiers seemed to enjoy the predicament 
of the much-heralded Rough Riders and dubbed them 
"Wood's Weary Walkers." At night they dried their 
remaining clothing before their campfires. Colonels 
Wood and Roosevelt, unable to wait at the landing-place 
for their personal baggage, took with them only their 
raincoats and toothbrushes. 

Marching, Indian file, through jungles and morasses, 
they soon encountered the Spaniards. They were made 
aware of the presence of the enemy by hearing, overhead, 
a peculiar singing like that of telegraph wires. Then the 
singing changed to "zip — zip — zip" through the tall 
grass, but they did not realize the cause of the uncanny 



142 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

sounds till they heard sickening thuds and saw their 
comrades fall. The sounds were produced by Mauser 
bullets which, by revolving and exploding, made jagged 
and painful wounds. 

Both Colonel Wood and Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt 
persisted in sharing the hardships and privations of the 
men in the ranks, and in going before the men into battle, 
though the privates protested against their leaders expos- 
ing themselves in this reckless way. 

The plainsmen, accustomed to remounting and going 
on with a round-up, even with a broken arm or leg, could 
not understand why they should stop fighting when 
wounded. Colonel Roosevelt, noticing a broncho- 
buster bleeding profusely, ordered the man to the rear. 
He hobbled away, but had returned in fifteen minutes 
with his wound bandaged. 

Another case of humoring his superior officer was that 
of Rowland, of New Mexico. The Colonel noticed that 
he was wounded. 

" Where are you hurt, Rowland?" he inquired. 

"Aw, they caved in a couple of ribs on me, I reckon," 
answered the man. 

Colonel Roosevelt ordered him to go to the hospital 
and let them take care of him there. This being the New 
Mexican's first engagement, he argued against going; but 
the Colonel's order was peremptory, so he started back, 
grumbling. In about half an hour Colonel Roosevelt saw 
Rowland fighting again in the front ranks. 

"I thought you were told to go to the hospital," he 
said to the man. 

"Aw — I couldn't find the hospital," said Rowland, 
exasperated. 

Major-General "Fighting Joe" Wheeler was in com- 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 143 

mand of the whole force at this time, but the Rough 
Riders were brigaded with the First and Tenth Regular 
Cavalry, under General S. M. B. Young, who had said 
to Roosevelt and Wood, months before: 

"If war comes, I will try to have you attached to my 
command, if I have one, and I'll give you a chance to see 
some fighting." 

General Young kept his word. The action at Las 
Guasimas, on June 24th, two days after the landing at 
Daiquiri, was the Rough Riders' baptism of fire. They 
lost eight men killed and thirty-four wounded. It was 
in this battle that Captain Capron, who, Roosevelt said, 
was perhaps the best soldier in the regiment, and Sergeant 
Hamilton Fish, Jr., lost their lives. At first, Wood and 
Roosevelt had some difficulty with their men, who had a 
tendency to fight, each man on his own account, as 
Indians, or, in their eagerness, would crowd together and 
impede each other. 

The Rough Riders who fell are buried in a common 
grave. Of them, Colonel Roosevelt has said: "Indian 
and cowboy, miner, packer and college athlete — the man 
of unknown ancestry from the lonely western plains and 
the man who carried on his watch the crests of the Stuy- 
vesants and the Fishes — were one in the way they had 
met death, just as during life they had been one in their 
daring and their loyalty." 

That evening, a Spanish officer said to the British 
Consul at Santiago: 

"The Americans do not fight like other men. When 
we fire, they run right toward us. We are not used to 
fighting men who act so." 

General Young was taken ill with fever and as Colonel 
Wood had to take his place, Lieutenant-Colonel Roosevelt 



144 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

took command, as Colonel of the First Volunteer Cavalry. 
After nearly a week of inaction, an order came, on 
June 30th, to hold themselves in readiness. That night 
they slept on El Paso Hill, where the soldiers found some 
good food left by Spaniards in their flight. Colonel 
Roosevelt, instead of appropriating a building for his 
headquarters, slept on the ground, with his raincoat for 
covering, and his saddle for a pillow. 

Next morning, July 1st, the battle began, near San- 
tiago — at El Caney and San Juan Hill. Colonel Roosevelt 
rode Texas. They could see the enemy, intrenched on 
an eminence which was afterwards called "Kettle Hill." 
The regular troops did not advance. Colonel Roosevelt 
rode up to the regular army officer and said, "I am 
ordered to support you in your attack." 

The regular officer merely nodded assent. 

"And you are waiting for orders to advance?" Colonel 
Roosevelt continued. 

The officer nodded again. 

"Then I am the ranking officer here, and I give you 
the order to attack." 

The surprised officer hesitated, looking doubtfully at 
the insistent Colonel. 

"Then let my men through, Sir," said the Colonel, 
and his men went through, grinning. The regulars, with 
a whoop, followed them, and as the Colonel waved his 
hat, they all went up the hill in a rush. Colonel Roosevelt 
dismounted and turned Texas loose, leading his men on 
foot. There was hot and incessant firing on both sides. 
The Americans were at a disadvantage, as they had com- 
mon black powder, while the enemy's powder was smoke- 
less. It was here that Colonel Roosevelt received his only 
wound, when a bullet nicked his elbow. 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 145 

When they had taken Kettle Hill, the next objective 
was San Juan Hill. Of the famous capture of this strong- 
hold, Colonel Roosevelt has given the following account, 
in "The Rough Riders:" 

"The infantry got nearer and nearer the crest of the 
hill. At last we could see the Spaniards running from the 
rifle-pits as the Americans came on in their final rush. 
Then I stopped my men, for fear they should injure their 
comrades, and called to them to charge the next line of 
trenches on the hills in our front, from which we had been 
undergoing a good deal of punishment. 

"Thinking that the men would all come I jumped 
over the wire fence in front of us, and started at the 
double; but as a matter of fact, the troopers were so 
excited, what with shooting and being shot, and shouting 
and cheering, that they did not hear or did not heed me; 
and after running about a hundred yards, I found I had 
only five men along with me." (One of these was mor- 
tally wounded and another shot in the leg.) 

"There was no use going on with the remaining three 
men, and I bade them stay where they were while I went 
back and brought up the rest of the brigade. . . They 
cheerfully nodded and sat down in the grass, firing back 
at the line of trenches from which the Spaniards were 
shooting at them. 

"Meanwhile, I ran back, jumped over the wire fence, 
and went over the crest of the hill, filled with anger against 
the troopers, and especially those of my own regiment, for 
not having accompanied me. They, of course, were quite 
innocent of wrong-doing; and even while I taunted them 
bitterly for not having followed me, it was all I could do 
not to smile at the look of inquiry and surprise that came 
over their faces, while they cried out: 
10 



146 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

"We didn't hear you — we didn't see you go, Colonel; 
lead on, now, we'll sure follow you." 

Back they went, up San Juan Hill, the regulars, white 
and black, mixed with the Rough Riders. The Rough 
Riders accepted the colored regulars with hearty good 
will, and were willing, in their own phrase, "to drink out 
of the same canteen." 

The day's losses were heavy. Out of less than five 
hundred Rough Riders engaged, eighty-nine were killed 
or wounded, the greatest loss of any regiment in the 
cavalry division engaged. 

This was the final engagement of the war. A fortnight 
later Santiago surrendered, and the army settled down 
to await further orders from Washington. The health of 
the troops was poor, and they were ravished by dysentery 
and malaria. The W T ar Department apparently took no 
interest in the situation, and could not be persuaded to 
issue the necessary orders for the return of the army to 
the United States. 

At last, General Shafter called a council of his division 
and brigade commanders and his chief medical officers. 
Roosevelt, who had been made commander of his brigade, 
attended the conference. All agreed that an authorita- 
tive publication should be made which would compel 
action by the War Department before it was too late. 
The officers of the regular army were afraid to incur the 
hostility of their superiors at Washington, and therefore 
persuaded Roosevelt to make the necessary statement. 
This he did, putting it in the form of a letter to Shafter. 
When he handed the letter to Shafter, the General refused 
to take it, but passed it on to the correspondent of the 
Associated Press, who was present. At the same time, 
General Ames made a statement to the correspondent, 



COLONEL OF THE ROUGH RIDERS 147 

and General Wood wrote a round-robin letter addressed 
to General Shafter, in which Roosevelt and others joined, 
setting forth the precarious situation of the army. 

As a result of these representations, the necessary 
orders were finally issued, and the army began its home- 
ward journey. The Rough Riders debarked at Montauk 
Point, at the extreme eastern end of Long Island. 

The newspapers reported at the time that when the 
vessel neared the wharf, the Colonel was observed leaning 
over the stern. Some one on the wharf called to him, 
inquiring whether he had had a good time. "Yes," he 
shouted back, "we had a bully fight." True or not, the 
story is characteristic. 



CHAPTER X 

Governor of New York 

NO sooner had Roosevelt landed at Montauk 
Point, than he became the center of political 
interest. The situation of the Republican party 
in New York was at this time critical in the extreme. In 
the 1897 mayoralty contest in New York City, United 
States Senator Thomas C. Piatt's stalwarts had broken 
with the independents, and as a result the Democrats had 
not only elected their candidate for mayor but had also 
carried the state by a majority of 61,000. In the coming 
campaign for Governor, Governor Black was considered 
a weak candidate for re-election. During his administra- 
tion the control of the state canals had given rise to serious 
scandals, which afforded excellent campaign material for 
the Democrats. The Republicans faced defeat unless 
they could find a nominee who would be acceptable not 
only to the party leaders but also to the independents. 

Piatt was at this time the undisputed leader of the 
Republican party in New York State. He had been active 
in the organization for twenty-five years and he owned it, 
lock, stock and barrel. He was reluctant to endorse 
Roosevelt for the nomination, because Roosevelt was not 
the type of Republican to whom he was accustomed to 
give orders. But a desperate situation demanded a 
desperate remedy, and repeated suggestions from local 
leaders indicated that Roosevelt was the only man who 
might conceivably pull the party through. 

In this state of affairs Lemuel E. Quigg, an old friend 

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GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 149 

of Roosevelt's and an active man in the party, called upon 
the Colonel in the camp at Montauk Point. He was 
anxious to know not only whether Roosevelt would accept 
the nomination, if it were offered to him, but also whether 
if he were elected he would immediately make war upon 
Senator Piatt and the Senator's lieutenants, disregarding 
their advice and wishes entirely. Roosevelt answered 
that he wanted to be Governor, that if he were to become 
Governor he would not make war upon Senator Piatt or 
upon anyone else unless compelled to do so; that he would 
consult organization men and independents alike; but 
that in every question the final decision would necessarily 
be his own, arrived at according to the dictates of his own 
conscience and in the exercise of his best judgment. With 
this statement Quigg was satisfied, and with it Senator 
Piatt was perforce content. 

Meanwhile, the independents of the Citizens' Union 
Party had tendered to Roosevelt the nomination for the 
governorship. He gave careful consideration to their 
proposal but was inclined to feel that his place was within 
his own party. On a morning toward the end of Septem- 
ber came the time for a final decision. As he was break- 
fasting at his sister's house in New York, he turned to 
one of his friends, who has repeated the conversation to 
me, and said: "This morning in this house two delega- 
tions are to be here — one, the Citizens Union Party, who 
say that if I take the regular Republican nomination for 
Governor of New York, I will be a 'dead cock in the pit' 
politically, and the other is a committee of the New York 
Republicans, to offer me the regular nomination for 
Governor. I shall accept it, as I believe I have a better 
chance to do good by cleaning up the Republican party 
within the organization." 



150 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

In carrying his determination into effect, he wrote a 
letter to the independents in which, after declining the 
honor which they had offered him, he said: 

"I write this with great reluctance, for I wish the 
support of every independent. If elected Governor, I 
would try to serve the state as a whole, and to serve 
my party by helping to serve the state. I should greatly 
like the aid of the independents and I appreciate the im- 
portance of the independent vote, but I cannot accept a 
nomination on terms that would make me feel disloyal 
to the principles for which I stand, or at the cost of act- 
ing with what seems to me bad faith towards my 
associates." 

On September 27th, the Republican State Convention 
met at Saratoga. The names of Governor Black and of 
Theodore Roosevelt were both placed before the con- 
vention. Black had a considerable following, who vehe- 
mently urged his renomination, but the large majority of 
the delegates were convinced of Black's ineligibility on 
account of the canal scandals, and were further convinced 
that only a highly popular man, who could take hold upon 
the popular imagination, would have any chance of suc- 
cess. Roosevelt was accordingly nominated by a vote of 
753 to 218. 

The Citizens' Union Party had hoped that Roosevelt 
would accept their nomination and that they would be 
able to force him as their nominee upon Piatt and the 
regular Republicans. Failing in this project they put 
their own candidates in the field headed by Theodore 
Bacon, a prominent lawyer of Rochester. The Democrats 
met in convention on September 29th, and chose Augustus 
Van Wyck, of Brooklyn, to head their ticket. Van 
Wyck was a judge of respectable character and attain- 



GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 151 

ments, and a brother of Mayor Van Wyck, of New 
York City. 

Roosevelt opened his campaign on October 17th, and 
for three weeks pursued it with great vigor. The issue 
most discussed was the canal scandal. The Colonel 
refused to express an opinion as to whether or not there 
had actually been any wrong-doing, but he promised a 
full and impartial investigation to be followed by com- 
plete publicity, and by punishment if punishment were 
deserved. The Democrats made all the capital they could 
out of the canal matter, and tried to brand Roosevelt as 
a mere tool of Senator Piatt. 

The Citizens' Union Party, although they had them- 
selves selected Roosevelt in the first instance, with the 
hope that they could compel the Republican organization 
to support him, turned upon him when he secured Repub- 
lican support on his own account and accused him of 
being controlled by the machine. Later the Colonel 
quoted with satisfaction a letter which he received from 
John Hay after the election, in which Hay said: 

"You have already shown that a man may be abso- 
lutely honest and yet practical; a reformer by instinct 
and a wise politician; brave, bold and uncompromising, 
and yet not a wild ass of the desert. The exhibition 
made by the professional independents in voting against 
you, for no reason on earth except that somebody else 
was voting for you, is a lesson that is worth its cost." 

Richard Croker was at this time the leader of Tam- 
many Hall, and had Van Wyck been elected would have 
held the whole state in the hollow of his hand. Roosevelt 
determined to make this fact clear to the voters by making 
the campaign so far as possible a personal issue between 
himself and Croker. Shortly before election time his 



152 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

opportunity came. For his own reasons Croker insisted 
that the Democrats should reject an excellent judge of 
their own party who was a candidate for re-election. 
Roosevelt promptly attacked this action and Croker 
came to the front as a campaign speaker. Thus the public 
came to feel that the contest was personal, that the two 
principals represented not only two different political 
parties but different political standards of right and wrong. 

"Roosevelt," said Senator Piatt, "made a dramatic 
campaign. He fairly pranced about the state. He called 
a spade 'a spade;' a crook *a crook.' During the final 
week of the canvass he made the issue Richard Croker, 
the Tammany boss, who had been so excoriated by the 
Lexow and Mazet committees. The Rough Rider 
romped home on election day with over 17,000 plurality." 
Out of a total of 1,350,000 votes cast this was not a wide 
margin, but the Republicans were well satisfied with their 
success. 

In permitting his name to be brought before the State 
Convention, and in accepting the nomination and support 
which ensued, Roosevelt followed a political principle 
which guided him all his life. He realized that little 
could be accomplished toward political or social improve- 
ment without organized effort, and that in an organiza- 
tion it was necessary to sink minor differences and to 
agree upon a common program which all might unite to 
further. He was a Republican by inheritance and by 
association, and having cast in his lot with that party he 
felt it his duty to stay within the party fold and to main- 
tain the party organization, except when distinct ques- 
tions of right and wrong made this impossible. Before 
his election as Governor he had promised that he would 
consult Senator Piatt and the other recognized party 



GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 153 

leaders on all matters of appointments and legislation, 
but he had served notice that his final conclusions would 
be his own and not theirs. "He religiously fulfilled this 
pledge," said Piatt, "although he frequently did just what 
he pleased." 

Shortly after the election, and before the Colonel took 
office, Piatt sent for him to talk over what was to be done 
at Albany. Piatt was old and rather feeble, and it was 
Roosevelt's custom, in spite of severe criticism, to go to 
Piatt when he wanted a conference instead of standing 
upon his dignity and insisting that Piatt should come to 
him. Upon this occasion he found the Senator with two 
or three of his lieutenants, discussing the constitution of 
the committees in the coming Legislature. The Senator 
asked the Colonel whether he had any member of the 
Assembly whom he wished to have put on any committee. 
The Colonel said no and expressed some surprise at the 
question because the Legislature had not yet met to choose 
the Speaker by whom all committees would be appointed. 

"Oh," answered the Senator, "he has not been chosen 
yet, but, of course, whoever we choose as Speaker will 
agree beforehand to make the appointments we wish." 

Roosevelt said nothing but made up his mind that if 
an attempt were made to put the Governor in the same 
category with the Speaker, there would be trouble. 

A few days later Piatt sent for him again to discuss 
the choice of a Superintendent of Public Works. The 
Superintendent of Public Works controlled the construc- 
tion of the Erie Canal and the position was doubly 
important because of the popular suspicion of the canal 
management during Black's administration. WTien Roose- 
velt arrived the Senator informed him that he, the Senator, 
had offered the Superintendent's position to a first-class 



156 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the Port of New York under President Harrison and 
was a good party man with a clean record. Piatt himself 
had suggested Hendricks for the position of Superin- 
tendent of Public Works and Roosevelt did not see how 
he could refuse to agree to his appointment as Superin- 
tendent of Insurance. Piatt, however, remained obdurate. 
At last a final meeting was arranged at the Union League 
Club between the Governor and one of Piatt's lieutenants. 
The Senator's ambassador went over the old ground and 
explained that Piatt would fight to the finish, that he 
was certain to win and that the Governor's political 
future would inevitably be destroyed. The Governor 
merely repeated that he had made up his mind and would 
not change. Again he was warned that this was his last 
chance and that ruin awaited him if he refused it. The 
rest of the story is best told in Roosevelt's own words. 
"I shook my head and answered, 'There is nothing 
to add to what I have already said.' He responded, 
'You have made up your mind?' and I said, 'I have.' 
He then said, 'You know it means your ruin?' and I 
answered, 'Well, we will see about that,' and walked 
toward the door. He said, 'You understand, the fight 
will begin tomorrow and will be carried on to the bitter 
end.' I said, 'Yes,' and added, as I reached the door, 
'Good night.' Then, as the door opened, my opponent, 
or visitor, whichever one chooses to call him, whose face 
was as impassive and as inscrutable as that of Mr. John 
Hamlin in a poker game, said: 'Hold on! We accept. 
Send in So-and-so (the man I had named). The Senator 
is very sorry, but he will make no further opposition.' 
I never saw a bluff carried more resolutely through to the 
final limit. My success in the affair, coupled with the 
appointment of Messrs. Partridge and Hooker, secured 



GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 157 

me against further effort to interfere with my handling 
of the executive departments." 

During his campaign the Governor had promised 
that a full and fair investigation would be made of the 
canal situation. This promise he fulfilled by selecting 
two well-known Democratic lawyers to whom the inves- 
tigation was unreservedly entrusted. These men spent 
several months in the task assigned to them and finally 
reported that although there had been gross delinquency 
in the prosecution of the work, there was no ground for 
criminal prosecution. In transmitting this report to 
the Legislature the Governor said, "There is probably 
no lawyer of high standing in the state who, after study- 
ing the report of counsel in this case and the testimony 
taken by the investigating commission, would disagree 
with them as to the impracticability of a successful 
prosecution. Under such circumstances the one remedy 
was a thorough change in the methods and management. 
This change has been made." 

He also appointed a non-partisan commission of 
business men and expert engineers, who were charged 
with the duty of investigating the whole canal question 
and of reporting what steps the state should take in 
order to establish a proper canal system. This com- 
mission was headed by General Francis V. Greene, to 
whom Roosevelt had in the first instance offered the 
position of Superintendent of Public Works. 

In January of 1900 the Governor sent to the Legis- 
lature the report of the special commission, in which it 
was recommended that sixty million dollars should be 
expended on a barge canal, to run from Buffalo to Albany. 
The expenditure of this vast sum of money naturally 
caused the Legislature to hesitate. Accordingly toward 



158 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the end of the session of 1900 the Governor sent an 
emergency message urging the passage of a bill to pro- 
vide for a complete and final survey of the canal situa- 
tion. This bill was passed on the last day of the session. 
The original report of General Greene's commission now 
forms the basis of the canal system of the State of 
New York. 

During the first year of his term the Governor had 
the satisfaction of procuring the passage of certain 
legislation which he earnestly advocated. In his first 
message he had asked for a civil service law to take 
the place of the one which had recently been unwisely 
repealed, and he had asked for an enlargement of the 
sphere of activity of factory inspectors, and for provisions 
looking toward a stricter enforcement of the labor laws. 
All of these recommendations were embodied in the stat- 
ute law during the year. The White Civil Service Act 
was passed by the Legislature on April 18th, and another 
bill was enacted limiting the hours of labor for women 
and minors. 

But by far the most important action of Roosevelt 
as Governor was his insistence upon the passage of the 
Ford Franchise Bill. John Ford, a member of the State 
Senate from New York City, had become convinced 
that the large public service corporations should pay 
taxes upon the perpetual franchises which they enjoyed. 
Taxation, especially in New York City, was rapidly 
becoming more and more burdensome and there appeared 
to be no sufficient reason for exempting valuable cor- 
porate franchises from paying their share of the public 
expenses. The matter was carried to the Governor, who 
convinced himself that Ford's suggestion was proper. 
But Senator Piatt was strongly opposed to the proposi- 



GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 159 

tion. He wrote the Governor a letter of protest, in which 
he accused him of entertaining ''various altruistic ideas 
— all very well in their way — but which, before they 
could safely be put into law, needed very profound con- 
sideration." 

What was more to the point, the Senator's control 
of the Legislature was such that the bill died in com- 
mittee. The Governor talked the matter over with a 
good many of the legislators and reached the conclusion 
that it would be impossible to succeed against the com- 
bined efforts of the corporation lobby and the party 
machine, without an aroused popular sentiment. Accord- 
ingly, just before the end of the session, he sent the 
Legislature a special message declaring the business 
urgent, and asking them to pass the bill immediately. 
This message was judiciously "lost" before it reached 
the Assembly, but by seven o'clock the next morning 
the Governor learned what had happened, and by eight 
o'clock he was in the Capitol. From the executive 
chamber he sent in another special message by his own 
secretary, with the intimation that if it were not promptly 
read he would come up in person and read it. Matters 
had been brought to such a pass that the Assemblymen 
realized that any further effort to defeat the bill might 
result in their own defeat at the next election, and they 
accordingly put it through with a rush. 

But this did not end the trouble. The bill had two 
obnoxious features which the Governor was determined 
to remedy immediately. He believed that the value of 
franchises should be assessed by a State Board instead 
of by local authorities, and that provision should be 
made for crediting the corporations with any tax which 
they already paid under existing laws. The corporations 



160 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

affected and the party leaders of both organizations 
urged the Governor not to sign the Ford Bill but to let 
the matter go over for another session and then to have 
it put in proper shape. But Roosevelt was determined 
not to let his opportunity pass by. He answered that 
he would call a special session of the Legislature for the 
purpose of passing an amended statute, but that if the 
Legislature failed to follow his recommendation, he 
would sign the bill in its present form. The Legislature 
was accordingly summoned to meet on May 22d. They 
passed an amended bill on May 25th and the Governor 
signed it on May 26th. A very considerable political 
victory had been won, and approximately two hundred 
million dollars' worth of franchises had been added to 
the taxable property of the state. 

In November, 1899, a Republican Legislature was 
again elected, and the Governor was able during the 
session of 1900 to procure the passage of several important 
pieces of legislation. He was authorized by the Legis- 
lature to appoint a commission to investigate tenement 
house conditions in New York City, and to suggest 
appropriate remedial legislation. He was also authorized 
to appoint a commission to study the question of revising 
the charter of the City of New York. His own experience 
as Police Commissioner gave him particular interest in 
this matter. Under his urgent pressure, a state hospital 
was created for incipient tuberculosis. The policy of 
protecting the state forests received his especial atten- 
tion and he attributed his success in this matter largely 
to a conference held in the executive chamber with 
forty of the best guides and woodsmen of the Adiron- 
dacks. The Board of Commissioners of the Palisades 
Interstate Park was formed to co-operate with New 



GOVERNOR OF NEW YORK 161 

Jersey in the preservation of the beautiful cliffs which 
border the Hudson. 

When Roosevelt lived in Washington as Civil Service 
Commissioner, one of his intimate friends was the German 
Attache, Baron Speck von Sternberg, who afterwards 
became German Ambassador at Washington when Roose- 
velt was President. The Baron always prophesied that 
his friend would become President. When Roosevelt 
was appointed Police Commissioner he wrote him, con- 
gratulating him on his appointment, adding: "When I 
again congratulate you, you will be one step nearer the 
White House." When Roosevelt became Assistant Sec- 
retary of the Navy, Sternberg wrote from Pekin, where 
he was stationed: "Permit me to congratulate you on 
this second step nearer the Presidency. " When Roosevelt 
was elected Governor of New York, the Baron tele- 
graphed: "The next time I offer congratulations it will 
be to President Roosevelt." 

Roosevelt could have had no better preparation, both 
politically and practically, for the Presidency than his 
experience in Albany as Governor of the greatest state 
of the Union. As we have seen, he accomplished good 
for the state. His administration was more than credit- 
able; but its chief value both to him personally and to 
the people of the United States was the education which 
the experience gave him for the vastly greater executive 
duties which he was so soon to assume. 

William Roscoe Thayer, in his "Life of John Hay," 
prints a letter from Roosevelt to Hay, who was then 
Secretary of State, in which Roosevelt gives a character- 
istically just estimate of his own work as Governor. The 
letter was written on February 7, 1899. 

"Compared with the great game of which Washington 
n 



162 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

is the center, my own work here is parochial, but it is 
interesting too; and so far I seem to have been fairly 
successful in overcoming the centrifugal forces always so 
strong in the Republican party. I am getting on well 
with Senator Piatt, and I am apparently satisfying the 
wishes of the best element in our own party; of course I 
have only begun, but so far I think the state is better 
and the party stronger from my administration." 



CHAPTER XI 

From Governor to President 

GARRETT A. HOBART, Vice-President of the 
United States, died on December 21, 1899. Specu- 
lation was rife as to who the Republicans would 
nominate as Vice-President in the Presidential campaign 
of 1900. Had Mr. Hobart lived, he would undoubtedly 
have been renominated, but his death made necessary 
the choice of another running mate for McKinley. 
Many names were suggested, especially those of John 
D. Long, Secretary of the Navy, and Representative 
Dolliver, of Iowa, but it soon appeared that the man who 
could win the greatest possible support, especially in 
the West, was Theodore Roosevelt. He did not wish the 
nomination. He had not completed the work he wanted 
to do as Governor of New York, and was anxious to be 
re-elected. In February, 1900, he stated publicly that 
he would not accept the nomination of Vice-President 
if it were offered to him, and there is no doubt that he 
was honest in expressing this determination. 

Mark Hanna was the leader of the Republican 
organization. He did not want Roosevelt; he wanted 
the Republicans to nominate a business ticket. At the 
same time, a successor to Roosevelt as Governor of 
New York had also to be elected. Senator Piatt had 
probably promised the nomination to Benjamin B. 
Odell. Whether this is true or not, he wanted to get 
Roosevelt out of New York and to "bury him" in the 
Vice-Presidency. A meeting was held of the New York 

(163) 



164 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

delegation to the Republican National Convention. 
The great majority were under the control of the Senator. 
Roosevelt tells us that the Senator notified him that he 
would be beaten for the nomination for Governor, if he 
refused to accept the nomination for Vice-President. 
Roosevelt told him that he accepted the challenge; 
that he would have a straight-out fight and that he 
would begin at once by telling the delegates of the threat 
and giving them fair warning that he intended to fight 
for the governorship. This threat apparently brought 
Piatt to terms, and the New York delegation ostensibly 
went to the convention pledged to support Lieutenant- 
Governor Woodruff for the vice-presidential nomination. 

As the convention approached, the movement for 
Roosevelt's nomination among delegates from the Western 
states became stronger and stronger. Apparently the 
whole country wanted him except official Washington. 
The attitude of the older men in Washington is set forth 
in a letter which John Hay wrote to Mr. Henry White 
at the Embassy at London. The letter, which is printed 
in Thayer's "Life of Hay," was written on June 15th, 
only four days before the meeting: 

"Teddy has been here; have you heard of it? It 
was more fun than a goat. He came down with a somber 
resolution thrown on his strenuous brow to let McKinley 
and Hanna know once for all that he would not be Vice- 
President, and found to his stupefaction that nobody in 
Washington except Piatt had ever dreamed of such a 
thing. He did not even have the chance to launch his 
nolo episcopari at the Major. That statesman said he 
did not want him on the ticket — that he would be far 
more valuable in New York — and Root said, with his 
frank and murderous smile, 'Of course not — you're not 



FROM GOVERNOR TO PRESIDENT 165 

fit for it.' And so he went back quite eased in his mind, 
but considerably bruised in his amour propre." 

The letter probably reflected accurately the official 
attitude in higher government circles, however Hay 
may have misjudged, as other older men sometimes 
misjudge, what affects a younger man's self-esteem. 

Washington, however, is not the country. When the 
Republican National Convention met, Roosevelt attended 
as a delegate at large from the State of New York. There 
are many and conflicting stories of what actually took 
place. Senator Piatt, in his Autobiography, tells us that 
he sent for Roosevelt and told him that Odell was going 
to be the next Governor of New York and that Roosevelt 
was at first determined to fight, and go before the State 
Convention if necessary, without Piatt's support, but 
that, before leaving the room, he had practically indicated 
that he would accept the nomination for Vice-President. 

In spite of different tales, it is not hard to see what 
actually took place. The overwhelming majority of the 
delegates wanted Roosevelt and did not want any one 
else. Had Hanna, with all his popularity and power 
over the convention, stated publicly that McKinley 
did not wish Roosevelt nominated, while the delegates 
might have acquiesced, all enthusiasm and snap would 
have been taken out of the subsequent campaign. It is 
certain that Hanna, and probable that McKinley, would 
have preferred another nominee, but they both wisely 
bowed to popular demand. On the other hand, it is 
equally certain that Roosevelt did not wish the nomina- 
tion, and that he was finally induced to accept by the 
combined force of two wholly different considerations. 
He knew Piatt's strength and the desperate fight he 
would probably make to prevent his, Roosevelt's, re-nomi- 



166 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

nation as Governor. If he went through the fight and 
won, well; but if he went through the fight and lost, 
nothing for himself or for the cause of good government 
in his native state would have been gained. Again, 
Roosevelt was not the man to be unmoved by the evident 
desire of the mass of the delegates for his nomination. 
He was a party man, and a good politician, and he 
probably appreciated that the man who refuses a nomi- 
nation which the overwhelming majority of his party 
enthusiastically wish him to take, is thereafter dead 
politically. Besides all this, as a party man, he probably 
felt the obligation arising from the unanimity of the call. 

On the day for nominations, the Governor of New 
York made a speech seconding McKinley's renomination 
for the Presidency. His speech was in effect his own 
nomination. The members of the convention hailed 
him as Vice-President, and the entire hall rang with 
cries for "Teddy." By the time nominations for Vice- 
President were in order, the convention was in an uproar, 
and when Young, of Ohio, who was to have presented 
Representative Dolliver's name for that office, formally 
presented the name of Roosevelt, the entire convention 
stampeded to him, demanding an immediate vote, so 
eager were they to ratify the will of the party and make 
the ticket McKinley and Roosevelt. 

Roosevelt threw himself into the Presidential cam- 
paign that followed as if he had desired the nomination, 
rather than fought against it. He visited twenty-four 
states and traveled twenty-one thousand miles, making 
nearly seven hundred speeches, a record which prob- 
ably at that time had never been equaled. 

When he went through the pro-silver Rocky Mountain 
states, the monotony of approval usually attendant upon 



FROM GOVERNOR TO PRESIDENT 167 

a campaign of political speaking was diversified by the 
necessity of facing hostile audiences. On September 25th, 
he made an address in a small hall at Victor, Colorado, 
a little mining town not far from Cripple Creek. Nearly 
all the members of the crowd were miners, and mostly 
Free Silver men and Bryanites. He began his address 
with an attack upon the New York Tammany politicians 
who, as stockholders of the Ice Trust, had profited during 
the previous summer from the distress of the poor people 
of the city. "In my state," he said, "the men who were 
put on the Committee on Platform to draw up an Anti- 
Trust plank at the Democratic National Convention 
at Kansas City had their pockets stuffed with Ice Trust 
stock." At this point a voice in the audience shouted, 
"What about the rotten beef?" "I ate it," responded 
Roosevelt instantly, "and you will never get near enough 
to be hit with a bullet, or within five miles of it." After 
this, he concluded his speech with some difficulty and 
left the hall under the escort of some of his own Rough 
Riders. On the way to the train he and his party, who 
were on foot, were attacked by a crowd of roughs, one 
of whom struck him in the chest with a stick. Finally, 
however, thanks to the protection of the Rough Riders, 
the party reached the station in safety and Roosevelt 
was none the worse for his experience; indeed, the occur- 
rence, which was made much of at the time, increased 
his popularity. 

Another town where trouble was expected fortunately 
contained an "old and valued friend, a 'two gun' man of 
repute," whose Christian name was Seth. Seth was not 
in the least quarrelsome, but he always kept his word. 
While Roosevelt spoke, his friend sat immediately 
behind him on the platform. The audience listened to 



168 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the speech with rapt attention. At the end, Roosevelt 
expressed to the chairman some satisfaction at the fact 
that the audience had been attentive and that he had 
not been subjected to a single interruption. "Inter- 
ruption," replied the chairman, "well I guess not! 
Seth had sent around word that if any son of a gun 
peeped he would kill him." 

In this campaign, as in all others made by their 
Colonel, men of the Rough Riders were his enthusiastic 
supporters. Buck Taylor, of Texas, for a time accom- 
panied him, and made a speech which took both with the 
Colonel and the audience. The peroration concluded 
as follows: "My fellow citizens, vote for my Colonel! 
Vote for my Colonel! — and he will lead you, as he led 
us, like sheep to the slaughter." The Colonel adds that 
while this did not seem to be very complimentary to his 
powers as a military leader, it delighted the crowd. 

In the election the Republicans swept the country, 
McKinley and Roosevelt receiving 292 electoral votes 
while Bryan and Stevenson received 155. The Republi- 
cans had a plurality of about 785,000, and, apart from 
the South, they carried every state except Colorado, 
Arkansas, Idaho, Kentucky, Missouri, Montana and 
Nevada. 

Roosevelt's term as Governor of New York came to 
an end on New Year's Day, 1901. He went on a short 
hunting trip to Colorado, and on March 4th was sworn 
in as Vice-President, presiding over the Executive 
Session of the Senate which was held immediately after 
his inauguration. 

As John Hay wrote to him, shortly after his inaugura- 
tion, the office was not precisely what his friends desired 
for him. At the same time had he remained Vice-Presi- 




&4 u o 



FROM GOVERNOR TO PRESIDENT 169 

dent, nothing could have kept him from doing good work 
or "from getting lots of fun out of it." He was not, 
however, to have the opportunity to make something 
out of the most useless and the dullest office which it has 
ever been given to the wit of man to devise. His time 
between March and September was partly taken up in 
making speeches and it was on one of these speaking 
tours that the news of the great tragedy at Buffalo came 
to him. 

On September 6th, McKinley was shot by the assas- 
sin Leon Czolgosz. The Vice-President was at Isle 
La Motte, near Burlington, Vermont. He had just fin- 
ished an address when he was informed of the tragedy. 
He went at once to Buffalo. The President had not 
been instantly killed. At dawn on the 7th he was still 
alive. All day he seemed to improve. The waiting 
nation began to breathe again. After two days, the 
attendant physicians informed Roosevelt that the Presi- 
dent was practically out of danger. Roosevelt then left 
Buffalo and joined Mrs. Roosevelt and the children, 
who were at the Tehawus Club House, in the wilds of 
the Adirondacks. Until the seventh day after the 
shooting, the President continued to improve — at least 
that was the tenure of the official bulletins issued by his 
physicians. It was therefore a shock to the nation when, 
on the seventh day, Friday, it was announced that the 
President was much worse and could not be expected to 
recover. Every effort was made to reach the Vice- 
President, but the Tehawus Club House, which is at the 
foot of Mt. Marcy, or Tehawus, was thirty-five miles 
from the nearest railroad and telegraph station at 
North Creek. When the telegram from the President's 
secretary, Cortelyou, reached the club, Roosevelt was 



170 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

off on a long tramp and there was no absolute certainty 
where he had gone or exactly when he would return. 
Several guides were dispatched in different directions to 
find him. Roosevelt has himself described his meeting 
with the guide: 

"We took a long tramp through the forest, and in the 
afternoon I climbed Mt. Tehawus. After reaching the 
top, I descended a few hundred feet to a shelf of land 
where there was a little lake, when I saw a guide coming 
out of the woods on our trail, from below. I felt at once 
that he had bad news, and sure enough, he handed me 
a telegram saying that the President's condition was 
much worse and that I must come to Buffalo imme- 
diately." 

The lake was some ten miles from the club house, 
which was not reached until after dark. There was 
considerable delay in obtaining a wagon, but finally it 
was obtained and throughout the night Roosevelt, alone 
with the driver, covered the thirty-five miles to North 
Creek. The road was a wilderness road, at first a mere 
trail, running on the edge of bluffs overhanging a chain 
of small lakes surrounded by mountains. The night was 
very dark and foggy. It was almost impossible for the 
driver to see the way, but it is recorded that his solitary 
passenger urged him continually to "Go on; go right 
ahead." During the night they changed horses several 
times. Dawn was breaking as he stepped on to the 
station platform at North Creek, to find his secretary, 
Mr. Loeb, waiting with a special train, and to learn 
that the President who was beloved of all the nation 
had died during the night. 

Roosevelt at once boarded the special train and by 
seven o'clock was in Albany. The trip across the state 



FROM GOVERNOR TO PRESIDENT 171 

to Buffalo was made in record time, and it was yet early 
in the afternoon of the 14th of September when he left 
the train at a station on the outskirts of Buffalo and 
drove directly to the house of his friend Ansley Wilcox, 
on Delaware Avenue. It was an old brick house painted 
white, with a row of stately pillars in front of a deep 
veranda. It had been used in the early part of the last 
century by United States officers in command of the 
military post at Buffalo. 

The body of the ex-President was at the house of his 
friend, John G. Milburn, the president of the Exposition. 
Here Roosevelt immediately repaired and met the mem- 
bers of McKinley's Cabinet then in Buffalo. Elihu Root, 
the Secretary of War, told him it was the desire of the 
Cabinet that there should be no further delay in his 
taking the oath of office. The ceremony took place in 
the early evening in the library of the Wilcox mansion. 
District Judge John R. Hazel administered the oath, 
which all Presidents, from Washington, have taken: 

"I do solemnly swear that I will faithfully execute 
the office of President of the United States, and will, to 
the best of my ability, preserve, protect and defend the 
Constitution of the United States." 

Roosevelt at once made the following statement 
which brought a deep sense of relief to the nation: "In 
this hour of deep national grief, I wish to state that it 
is my aim to continue absolutely unbroken the policy 
of W T illiam McKinley for the peace, prosperity and honor 
of our beloved country." 

Those present at the ceremony were Elihu Root, 
Secretary of War; Ethan Allen Hitchcock, Secretary of 
the Interior; John D. Long, Secretary of the Navy; 
Charles Emory Smith, Postmaster General; besides 



172 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

members of the Wilcox and Milburn families, the 
doctors who had been attending the late President, and 
the private secretaries, Cortelyou and Loeb. By a 
curious coincidence, one of those present, Elihu Root, had, 
as a friend, been present twenty years before at a similar 
ceremony when Vice-President Arthur succeeded Presi- 
dent Garfield. 

The new President accompanied the remains of 
President McKinley to Washington, and subsequently 
to Canton, Ohio. He stood by the side of the grave 
during those five minutes when all the wheels of industry 
throughout the length and breadth of the country were 
stopped and eighty million people paused in their multi- 
tudinous occupations in loving respect for the kindly, 
upright gentleman, the patriot and statesman who had 
met his cruel fate so bravely. 

No better statement concerning his predecessor 
has ever been made than that contained in President 
Roosevelt's first official proclamation, in which he said: 
"President McKinley crowned a life of largest love for 
his fellowmen, of most earnest endeavor for their welfare, 
by a death of Christian fortitude; and both the way in 
which he lived his life and the way in which, in the 
supreme hour of trial, he met his death, will remain for- 
ever a precious heritage of our people." 

The position of the new President was a most difficult 
one. McKinley had had, as he deserved to have, the 
confidence of the nation. True, the man whom death, 
sudden and tragic, had put in McKinley's place, was, 
himself, deservedly popular, especially with the younger 
part of the nation. But popularity is one thing; popular 
confidence quite another. Roosevelt was only forty- 
two— younger than any other man who had ever held 



FROM GOVERNOR TO PRESIDENT 173 

the great office of President. Furthermore, the very 
characteristics which made him popular, his infinite 
dash and originality, are not qualities which lead men 
easily to give their confidence to those who possess them. 
Again, there were the grim facts of our national history. 
Four times before had death placed a Vice-President in 
the Presidential chair. Tyler succeeding Harrison, had 
disrupted his party by repudiating the policies on which 
both he and Harrison had been elected; Fillmore, tak- 
ing Taylor's place, had ended his party's power for all 
time; Johnson, succeeding Lincoln, made by the folly 
of his actions far worse the catastrophe of Lincoln's 
death; while Arthur, succeeding Garfield, though he 
gave the country a respectable administration, had not 
created any general desire for his retention in office. 

Roosevelt succeeded where four others failed. He 
did so, not merely because he was an infinitely abler 
man than Tyler or Fillmore or Johnson or Arthur, but 
also because of that characteristic in him to which, as 
much as to any other single thing, he owed all the great 
successes of his life. Although his enemies, up to the day 
of his death, accused him of filling the cosmos with his 
own ego, he was, as a matter of fact, always infinitely 
more interested in the work he had to do than in either 
his own future or in the attitude of the nation towards 
himself. When he said, as he took the oath of office, 
that he would carry out the policy of McKinley, he meant, 
as he always did, exactly what he said. There was no 
better way to carry out the policy of his predecessor 
than to ask the members of McKinley's Cabinet to remain 
in office. So he asked them to remain. Told by his 
friends that people would regard him as but a "pale copy 
of McKinley," he replied, that he was not worrying 



174 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

about that. Neither was he concerned as to whether 
the members of his Cabinet would be faithful to him. 
All he asked of them was that they should be faithful 
to their work. Thus he followed the policy of McKin- 
ley, keeping McKinley's Cabinet, and thereby at once 
gained the confidence of the people. 

As new problems arose, he did not ask himself whether 
he was or was not meeting them as McKinley would have 
met them; his desire was to meet them in the right way. 
Thus, by not worrying about how people would judge 
him and by losing himself in his work, as well as by his 
force and ability, he soon impressed his personality on 
the nation, demonstrating his competence for his high 
office by his deeds. The story of his Presidency is the 
story of Theodore Roosevelt, not the story of any "pale 
copy" of his predecessor. 



CHAPTER XII 

Roosevelt in the White House 

THE White House had seen many Presidents and 
their families, but no man at all like Roosevelt had 
ever been there before. He was bubbling over 
with an energy which he communicated to everyone who 
came in contact with him. This tremendous mental and 
physical activity had always been characteristic. W. R. 
Thayer in his life of Hay relates that when Roosevelt was 
Civil Service Commissioner Rudyard Kipling was in 
Washington. Kipling used to drop in at the Cosmos Club, 
and presently Roosevelt would "come and pour out pro- 
jects, discussions of men and politics, criticisms of books, in 
a swift and full-volumed stream, tremendously emphatic 
and enlivened by bursts of humor." "I curled up on 
the seat opposite," said Kipling, "and listened and won- 
dered, until the universe seemed to be spinning around 
and Theodore was the spinner." The spinner now held 
the greatest constitutional office on earth. Another 
Englishman, John Morley, declared that the two things in 
America which seemed to him most extraordinary were 
Niagara Falls and President Roosevelt. 

Daily physical exercise of a strenuous character was 
essential to him. He usually succeeded in getting in two 
hours out of every twenty-four in horseback riding, tennis, 
walking, broadsword or single stick, according to the 
weather or the time of year. While he was Governor he 
had regularly wrestled three or four times a week with the 
champion middle-weight wrestler of America. The cham- 

(175) 



176 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

pion, departing from Albany, left a substitute who could 
neither take care of himself nor of Roosevelt, with the result 
that Roosevelt caved in two of his antagonist's ribs and had 
two of his own badly damaged. Thereafter he ceased what 
we may call serious wrestling, though for a time after he 
became President, he engaged in minor wrestling bouts 
with "Joe" Grant, champion of the District of Columbia. 
He took a great deal of interest in the science of jiu jitsu, 
which was then new to this country, and for two seasons a 
famous Japanese wrestler on a visit to America gave him 
instructions in it. John Hay, Secretary of State, gravely 
records in his diary, under date of April 26, 1904: "At 
the Cabinet this morning the President talked of his 
Japanese wrestler, who is giving him lessons in jiu jitsu. 
He says the muscles of his throat are so powerfully de- 
veloped by training that it is impossible for any ordinary 
man to strangle him. If the President succeeds once in a 
while in getting the better of him, he says, 'Good! 
Lovely!' " 

Roosevelt was a good boxer and exceedingly fond of 
the sport. More than one famous champion of the squared 
circle was his devoted and respected friend. He kept up 
his boxing after he became President until a young cap- 
tain of artillery cross-countered him on the left eye. The 
blow broke the little blood-vessels and as a consequence 
the sight was thereafter so dimmed that the eye became 
practically useless. Had it been his right eye the African 
hunting trip could not have been undertaken unless, indeed, 
he had learned to shoot from his left shoulder. 

He played tennis vigorously on the White House 
courts, though he never became very expert, there being 
no danger at any time of the President's entering the 
National Tennis Tournament at Newport. 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 177 

Another favorite form of exercise was horseback riding. 
His splendid horsemanship is well attested by the photo- 
graphs taken of him while jumping hurdles at Chevy 
Chase, one photograph showing him clearing in good 
style a high wooden fence, being perhaps the most 
popular picture taken while he was President. 

On October 22, 1904, a fall with his horse nearly cost 
him his life. At first it was thought that he was only badly 
battered about the face, but he had landed fairly on his 
head, his neck and shoulders were severely wrenched, and 
for a few days there was a grave possibility of meningitis. 
Had he not been so strong and well knit, it is more than 
probable that his spine would have suffered permanent 
injury. 

He was also a devotee of cross-country walking. All 
children know, or ought to know, the delight of walking 
from one point to another without turning to the right or 
left, over fences and across streams, scrambling up hill 
and sliding down. A few grown-ups have the health, 
strength and boyish spirit to follow the practice in maturer 
years. Roosevelt was one of these grown-ups. His 
favorite place to take a ten or fifteen mile "stroll" was 
along Rock Creek, where there was plenty of climbing to 
be had. Sometimes, in the early spring, when the ice had 
not entirely disappeared, he would arrange for a "point to 
point" walk, he and his companions swimming the creek, 
or even the Potomac itself, if that river came in their way. 

Roosevelt says, "Of course, on such occasions we had 
to arrange that our return to Washington should be when 
it was dark, so that our appearance might scandalize no 
one." It is to be feared, however, that the staid ones in 
Washington and elsewhere, hearing of these trips, had a 
tendency to be scandalized. 

12 



178 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Rain, snow and sleet never interfered with his going 
out; neither was he easily turned back by mishap. Colonel 
W. H. Crook, in his "Memories of the White House," 
relates that the President on one occasion took a stroll for 
about two hours through the marshes southwest of the 
Executive Mansion, with Pinchot, of the Forest Service, 
and Sloan, of the Secret Service. "Pushing vigorously 
onward, as usual, the President came to an especially 
soft spot in the soggy surroundings, but, looking ahead, 
thought he saw firm ground." Calling to the others to 
follow, he plunged along and was soon up to his waist in 
the icy water. It was some minutes before the party 
extricated themselves. The thermometer was below 
freezing; the atmosphere was raw; the hour was already 
late, but the President, instead of turning back, merely 
laughed at the little adventure, and started off at a swing- 
ing gait across country. 

Once he took a distinguished citizen out for a stroll 
and directed the course of their steps toward a steep and 
rocky hill. As they began the climb, he turned to his 
companion and said, "We must get up to the top here." 
When they had reached the top, the other turned to him 
and said, "Mr. President, may I ask why we are up here?" 
"Why, I came up here," answered Roosevelt, "to see if 
you could make it." 

The faster the pace and the more obstacles there were 
to be surmounted, the better the President was pleased. 
On one of these occasions, shortly after he came to the 
White House, he invited a newly appointed bureau chief 
to be one of the party. They walked along the shore of the 
Potomac River to a point where a stone quarry jutted 
out into the water. Here it was possible either to take a 
boat or to crawl around the face of the quarry, holding on 




@ Clinedinut, WashinQtcn, I). ( 



OVER THE JUMPS 

phot^^S^n^ri 1 " ° f P ,1 " m , 1 R "" :, ' V " U is weU attested by these 
iJnuLugidpns taken at Uhevy Chase during his presidency RidW u-,< nno of v,; - 

fevonte forms of exercise and he had the n,narkal,l = f s uV.lt v « el, en 1 , r , 
actlvit^^ HlS mmd fr ° m ^ Pr ° blemS ° f statesmanship oy So^fi 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 179 

with eyelids and finger tips. The President and his son 
Theodore and the young official chose the more difficult 
method, while the stouter and less agile members of the 
party took the boat. All got home in safety and the 
President felt increased confidence in the spirit of the new 
bureau chief, to whom he had entrusted the performance 
of a difficult piece of official work. 

On these strenuous afternoon walks the President was 
accompanied by cabinet officers, senators, representatives, 
diplomats and other distinguished foreigners, in fact, by 
any one whom it occurred to him to ask; but more often 
by his intimate personal friends, the French Ambassador, 
M. Jusserand, James R. Garfield, Robert Bacon, Lawrence 
Murray, Gifford Pinchot, or Herbert Knox Smith. 

Some of the young officers who accompanied him on 
his walks called his attention to the fact that many of the 
older officers were physically unfit for any serious exertion. 
After consulting with Major-Generals Wood and Bell, he 
issued an order directing that each officer should prove 
himself fit to walk fifty or ride one hundred miles in three 
consecutive days — not a very drastic requirement, but 
he had learned by experience that a non-military nation 
reacts in curious fashion to any attempt to make its army 
or navy efficient. Extraordinary as it may now appear, 
no sooner had he issued the order than the press of the 
country rang with this new evidence of his "capricious 
tyranny." Many elderly officers of sedentary habits 
intrigued with their friends in Congress to have the order 
annulled, and one naval bureau chief went so far as to 
rebuke some young officers who walked fifty miles in one 
day, requiring them to take the walk over again in three 
days, in accordance with the letter of the President's 
order. It is needless to say that Roosevelt did not know 



180 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of this action, or he would have made short work of that 
bureaucrat. The clamor did not subside until the Presi- 
dent himself and two officers, in one day, rode more than 
a hundred miles over frozen Virginia roads, part of the 
time in a snow and sleet storm, in this way demonstrating 
the silliness of the opposition to an order requiring each 
officer to perform the same feat in three days. 

During the early part of Roosevelt's first administra- 
tion the White House was entirely remodeled. For a good 
many years this change had been considered, and various 
plans had been suggested for carrying it into effect. By 
the alterations there was produced a real Colonial mansion 
with spacious rooms, wide halls and ample stairways. 
The entire eastern interior of the old building was torn 
out and rebuilt, a new floor and wainscoting were put in 
the historic East Room, and other new floors were added 
in various parts of the house. The most important change 
was the building of a long, low office extension in which 
the executive business is now transacted. 

The White House is, of course, not only an American 
gentleman's home, but it is the official residence of the 
head of the nation. To manage the necessary corps of 
servants and assistants, to prepare for formal and informal 
dinners and receptions, and to superintend the upkeep of 
the entire establishment is a very considerable enterprise. 
Some idea of the size of this as a housekeeping proposition 
may be gained from the fact that during Roosevelt's 
administration $145,000.00 was annually appropriated by 
Congress for the maintenance of the White House and for 
the payment of wages and similar current expenses. 

The Roosevelts entertained in two ways; they held 
state dinners and receptions in fulfilment of their official 
duties, and they also invited their own personal friends and 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 181 

the Colonel's political acquaintances on occasions of a 
less formal character. When they entertained formally, 
they did so as the President and his wife; when they 
entertained privately, it was as Mr. and Mrs Theodore 
Roosevelt. 

Roosevelt was at once the most democratic and the 
most formal of Presidents. On state occasions there was 
more formality in the White House than there had been 
under any President since Washington. State dinners 
were not given in the manner of a rich private citizen 
entertaining his friends, for on such occasions the Colonel 
never forgot that he was acting as President of the United 
States, and every smallest detail of the function impressed 
the guests with that fact. On the occasion of a formal 
dinner, the guests were assembled in the East Room before 
the appointed hour. Promptly at eight the doors would 
open to admit the President and Mrs. Roosevelt. The 
President would give his arm to the lady who was to sit 
on his right, and would at once lead the way to the great 
dining-room. Some complained that this was aping the 
style and manner of royalty on similar occasions; as a 
matter of fact, it was nothing of the sort. It merely 
emphasized the fact that the entertainment of the diplo- 
matic corps or of the judiciary, as the case might be, 
was one of the official acts of the President of the United 
States. 

These state dinners were undoubtedly dreary, as all 
such functions must be. There is usually no common 
interest to unite the guests, except the political activities 
of the men of the party. The guests are invited, not for 
the purpose of conversation, but simply for the purpose 
of fulfilling that public duty, born of immemorial custom, 
which requires that distinguished citizens be handsomely 



182 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

fed at stated intervals. In this manner, dinners were 
given every year to the Cabinet, the Supreme Court, the 
army, the navy and the diplomatic corps. 

State receptions were matters of considerable import- 
ance. Shortly after the Roosevelts came to the White 
House, nearly five hundred guests arrived at a reception 
for which only two hundred and fifty invitations had been 
issued. After this, Mrs. Roosevelt sent out invitations 
which required a reply, and limited her entertainments 
to those whom she had actually asked. The annual New 
Year's reception was open to anyone who cared to attend, 
but certain people were asked to assist Mr. and Mrs. 
Roosevelt in receiving the guests, and these were furnished 
with identification cards which admitted them to the 
Blue Room before the reception actually began. Am- 
bassadors and ministers of legation were also given cards 
which admitted them by the south entrance to a special 
suite, from which they could make their way, at their 
convenience, to the principal gathering. 

Roosevelt was very fond of informal entertainments, 
and used them constantly to get in touch with other men 
on matters in which they were mutually interested. He 
often invited a morning caller to return at lunch time to 
complete an interrupted conversation. Frequently a 
telephone message would ask a guest on short notice to 
lunch at the White House, and the President was thus 
often able to see in a friendly way men with whom it 
would have been more difficult to confer in the stiffer 
atmosphere of the Executive study. After the Cabinet 
meetings one or more of the members usually stayed to 
have lunch with the President, in order to continue the 
discussion of some matter which had arisen during the 
meeting. Andre Tardieu remembers meeting at one 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 183 

luncheon two Catholic prelates, a Protestant bishop, a 
college president and the French Ambassador and his 
wife. All of these had, no doubt, been asked because the 
President had some special matter which he wanted to 
take up with each one of them. 

Jacob A. Riis had been a close friend of Roosevelt's 
ever since the days of his service as Police Commissioner. 
Riis and his wife were frequent visitors at the White 
House and he has left an interesting picture of his im- 
pressions there. "I shall never forget," he writes, "the 
Christmas before last, when I told the President and Mrs. 
Roosevelt at breakfast of my old mother who was sick 
in Denmark and longing for her boy, and my hostess's 
gentle voice as she said, 'Theodore, let us cable over our 
love to her.' And they did. Before that winter day was 
at an end (and the twilight shadows were stealing over 
the old town by the bleak North Sea, even while we break- 
fasted in Washington) the telegraph messenger, in a state 
of bewilderment — I dare say he has not got over it yet — 
brought mother this despatch: 

" 'The White House, Dec. 20, 1902. 
" 'Mrs. Riis, Ribe, Denmark : 

" 'Your son is breakfasting with us. We send you our 
loving sympathy. 

" 'Theodore and Edith Roosevelt.' " 

Like every President, Colonel Roosevelt received 
countless gifts from admirers all over the country. During 
the time when there was a great deal of talk about the 
"big stick," he received quantities of big sticks cut from 
every kind of tree. Crates came constantly with live ani- 
mals of every description, including such undomesticated 
species as foxes and coons. One day one of the news- 
papers reported, very probably with no basis of truth, that 



184 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

a dog of which the President was particularly fond had 
been whipped in a fight. A few days later there arrived 
from one of Roosevelt's friends in Ohio a crate containing 
an enormous bulldog. With the crate came a note explain- 
ing that the President might safely put his trust in the 
bulldog, because "the brute had never yet been licked in a 
fight," and the sender didn't think he ever would be. Of 
course the President was not able to keep gifts of this kind, 
and had to find a home for the dog outside of the White 
House. But the animal flourished in Washington for some 
time, and is reputed to have justified his former owner's 
high opinion of him as a warrior. 

The Roosevelts brought a large family of children to 
the White House with them. Alice was already a young 
lady nearly eighteen, and her marriage to Nicholas 
Longworth, one of the Republican Representatives from 
Ohio, was a great social event in Washington in the winter 
of 1906. Theodore, Jr., Kermit and Ethel were fourteen, 
twelve and ten respectively. The two youngest were 
Archibald and Quentin, who were seven and four. The 
household was a lively one and would have afforded many 
interesting stories for the reporters if they had been 
allowed to publish them. But Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt 
drew a sharp line between their official life and their 
private life. 

Since 1889 they had spent most of their winters in 
Washington and they had their own circle of personal friends 
and their own strictly family life. No President has ever 
known personally so many reporters and representatives of 
the press. Roosevelt permitted the publication of all kinds 
of stories in regard to his own manifold activities, his stren- 
uous walks and rides, his boxing, wrestling and tennis. 
But he would not permit the magazines and newspapers 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 185 

to be filled with accounts of the intimate life of his family. 
The reporters knew that he disliked this and generally 
respected his wishes. One representative of a large daily, 
however, having nothing of startling interest to relate, 
sent his paper a report that the Roosevelt children had 
amused themselves by chasing a turkey over the White 
House grounds and by finally despatching it with a gun 
or hatchet. There was, of course, not one word of truth 
in the tale. The President was furious. As a father, and 
as a sportsman, he keenly resented the imputation that 
his children had been engaged in an act of wanton cruelty, 
and he was probably aware that it was the kind of story 
that would readily be believed by some of those who had 
read accounts of his western adventures. He ordered that 
neither the reporter who had invented the tale, nor any 
other representative of his paper, should ever be permitted 
to enter the WTiite House again during his administration. 
The two younger children, Archie and Quentin, were 
lively boys full of a good deal of natural mischief. There is 
a story that on the first night of their arrival they set out 
for an inspection of the grounds. As darkness approached, 
the lamp lighter came down Pennsylvania Avenue light- 
ing the gas jets on the lamp posts as he came. As soon as 
he had completed his work on one side of the park he 
hurried over to the other, whereupon the two boys 
scrambled up the lamp posts, one by one, and turned out 
all the lights which he had already lit. In the middle of 
this enterprise they were suddenly arrested by a watch- 
man who had been somewhat mystified by the curious 
phenomenon of the disappearing lights. When the watch- 
man found that his two prisoners were sons of the Presi- 
dent, he wisely decided to allow them to escape from 
custody. 



186 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

The children were given the free run of the White 
House grounds and were allowed to climb the trees and 
generally to make themselves at home so long as they did 
not interfere with the business or pleasure of Mr. and Mrs. 
Roosevelt's many visitors. As soon as they were old 
enough to learn they were all taught to ride horseback, so 
that they were able to join their father and mother in the 
afternoon's exercise. Their pets were numerous and 
ubiquitous. Theodore at one time had a blue macaw 
named Eli Yale; Kermit had a black and tan terrier 
called "Jack;" while Quentin when he was only five rode 
a tiny pony, "Algonquin." Jacob Riis recalls his amuse- 
ment when Kermit produced a pet kangaroo rat from his 
pocket at breakfast one morning, and let it hop across the 
table to eat a piece of sugar from the President's hand. 

Archie was a frequent visitor to an animal shop near 
the White House, from which the owner allowed him to 
borrow pets from time to time. On one occasion when the 
President was talking with Representative Hepburn 
about the important matter of the Railroad Rate Bill, 
Archie burst in to show his father a king snake which he 
had brought home from the store. He was holding the 
snake inside his coat and it had managed to wriggle 
partly down his sleeve. Hepburn, naturally, did not take 
in exactly what was going on, and seeing that the boy was 
having some difficulty with his coat, started to help him 
off with it. When the coat came off and disclosed the 
small boy plus the large snake, the Congressman jumped 
back with considerable alacrity. 

Playing with the children was, for the President, an 
important and necessary part of the day. The favorite 
amusement was the game of bear. The Colonel himself 
took the part of a very active and ferocious animal and 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 187 

was pursued across the floor by the young hunters, armed 
with umbrellas or fire irons, or any other object which 
was at hand. When the chase ended by the killing or 
capture of the bear, the positions w T ere reversed, and the 
President became the hunter while the children scrambled 
under the chairs and tables to escape his deadly aim. 

The younger children, especially Quentin, usually 
appeared at the afternoon tennis games and sat perched 
on the fence, keeping a watchful eye on the pitchers of 
lemonade and the ginger-bread or cookies which were set 
out to refresh the players, and joining with enthusiasm in 
their consumption. 

No interest of the children was so small that the busy 
President did not find time to share it. Colonel Crook, 
the disbursing officer of the White House, tells of a 
gentleman from Indiana who called upon him one day 
bringing his son who was eight years old. The little boy 
had read of Quentin, and being about the same age, had 
concluded to make a present for him. So in his father's 
workshop, after considerable effort, he succeeded in 
making a steel top which he had now come to present. 
Roosevelt, hearing that the boy was there, insisted on 
seeing him, and on finding out how the top could be spun. 
Accordingly the boy was brought to the White House 
where he and the Chief Executive of the nation solemnly 
conferred on the subject of tops and how to spin them. 

Christmas was always a very happy time in the 
Roosevelt household. The Colonel looked back to the 
Christmas celebrations of his own childhood with pecu- 
liar happiness, and he and Mrs. Roosevelt tried to 
reproduce those festivities as far as possible for their own 
children. Every child had his own stocking, of course, 
and afterwards the larger presents. For simplicity's sake 



188 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

there was no Christmas tree, but this did not seem to mar 
the family's pleasure. On their second Christmas in the 
White House, Archie hid a tiny tree in an unused closet 
and got the White House electrician to put little colored 
electric lights on it. When the great day came the door 
was thrown open and disclosed the tree covered with 
boyish presents for his father and mother. 

The family life of the Roosevelts in the White House 
was thoroughly normal and happy. The father and 
mother were devoted to their children and were never 
distracted from their duty toward them by considerations 
which might have been thought more important. As a 
matter of fact they felt keenly that nothing could be more 
important than the training of their own children, and 
they were careful to carry out in their private life the 
principles of home-making which the Colonel so often 
insisted upon in public. 

To have in the White House a man who was a public 
character, and at the same time their father, must have 
puzzled the children. When the Colonel left to join his 
regiment in 1898, one of the boys, by way of saying good- 
bye, clasped him round the legs with a beaming smile and 
said, "And is my father going to the war, and will he 
bring me back a bear?" When he returned some months 
later, in a strange uniform, the same little boy was a 
good deal puzzled as to his identity, but greeted him 
pleasantly with, "Good afternoon, Colonel." Shortly 
afterwards somebody asked him where his father was, 
and he answered, "I don't know; but the Colonel is 
taking a bath." 

It has been said that the work and responsibility of 
the Presidency wears down the strength of the strongest 
man, but the work did not wear on Roosevelt. Doubtless 




{£) Pack Brothers. 

THE ROOSEVELT FAMILY IN 1903 

From left to right: Quentin, the President, Theodore, Jr., Archie, Alice, 
Kermit, Mrs. Roosevelt, Ethel. 




NOMINATED FOR THE VICE-PRESIDENCY 
Colonel Roosevelt's fight, for clean politics, while Governor of New York, 
so embarrassed [the politicians that they forced upon him the nomination for Vice- 
President. He is seen here at Sagamore Hill with the committee that notified him 
of his nomination in 1899. 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 189 

he had his moments of discouragement and weariness, 
but ninety-nine one-hundredths of the time he thoroughly 
enjoyed the life, turning from one piece of work to another 
with tireless, enthusiastic energy. Each morning he 
literally bounded down the White House stairs to his 
executive offices, and plunged into the multifarious and 
often momentous duties and activities of the day with a 
zest that infected all about him. 

The handling of the business of the White House was 
a model of efficiency. Every appointment was carefully 
scheduled as far as possible in advance. The files were 
very complete and ready of access, and as a business 
office it was probably one of the best in the government 
service. Upon arriving at his office, the President would 
dispose of such important parts of his mail as were brought 
to his attention, glancing at the newspapers, usually 
looking over four of the leading papers from different 
parts of the country. From about ten until noon, unless 
it were Cabinet day, he would see people by appointment, 
and also senators, representatives, ambassadors and 
ministers, a constant stream of men representing political 
and other interests. Their business was promptly and 
efficiently disposed of, usually a bit of fun or social talk 
being mingled with more serious matters. But there were 
no delays or stoppages of the stream except when some 
particular character arrived — and he might be almost 
any sort of character — an explorer, a naturalist with a 
new bird, John L. Sullivan from Boston, a Rough Rider, 
a ranchman, or one of the shining lights of literature. 
When this happened, people might wait for a while, while 
the President extracted the utmost possible information 
of interest and amusement from that particular caller. 
Then the stream would go on again. The callers came first 



190 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

into the main outer office. From there, when the Cabinet 
was not in session, some of them would be admitted to 
the Cabjnet room. Very frequently the door between the 
Cabinet room and the President's office would be open, 
and the waiting callers would see the vigorous action 
and hear the remarks of the President, whose business 
seemed never to be such that there was need of any 
secrecy. 

In the meantime there would be gathered in the outer 
office and in the Cabinet room plain American citizens — 
men, women and children — from all over the country, 
who had come merely to see the President. Three or four 
times during the morning business would stop, these 
friendly visitors would line up all around the Cabinet 
room, the President would drop everything else and start 
down the line. Usually many of the callers had someone 
to introduce them to the President. In about half the 
cases he either knew these people personally or knew of 
them, and his amazing memory and tremendous interest 
in people enabled him to say something that was personal 
to each visitor, and especially to the children. Fifty or 
sixty people would thus see him, shake hands, and in 
fifteen minutes go out again with the sense of having met 
a friend and of having spoken to the President. He had 
a genuine love for human beings of whatever station in 
life and probably enjoyed this part of his morning's work 
more than anything else. 

A Congressman from a western state once told me 
that there arrived in Washington from the city of X one 
of his constituents, a Mr. B., a saloon-keeper. He brought 
with him his wife and little girl. They wanted to meet the 
President. The Congressman's heart sank somewhat as 
he looked at the trio. Mrs. B.'s ideas of dress for state 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 191 

occasions were lurid, while the child wore at one time at 
least three sweaters of different colors. The Congressman 
was equal to the occasion, however, and they went to the 
White House and stood among the waiting guests while 
the President came down the line. He gave Mr. B. a 
hearty shake of the hand, found out his native city, and 
instantly asked him about a mutual friend living in the 
same ward. Then, shaking Mrs. B. by the hand, he was 
about to pass on when his attention was attracted by the 
child. Stooping down, he spoke heartily to the little girl, 
saying to her mother, "This is your child — a perfect 
likeness." "Yes," replied the proud mother, "and I have 
six more at home." Like a flash the President grasped her 
by the hand again, shaking it vigorously, and saying, in 
his most emphatic manner: "Bully for you, Mrs. B., 
bully for you." It is needless to say that that couple, like 
hundreds of others, left Washington with a feeling that 
their visit had been a great event in their lives. 

If it happened to be Cabinet day, either Tuesday or 
Friday, the schedule which I have outlined would be 
somewhat changed. Few morning appointments were 
made for these days. The Cabinet met at eleven, in the 
big Cabinet room adjoining the President's office, the 
members sitting around the table in the order of the 
respective seniorities of their departments, and laid be- 
fore the President the important questions arising in the 
jurisdiction of each. 

About one or half-past was luncheon in the White 
House. Here almost always there were guests — usually 
naturalists or literary men or travelers, but frequently 
government business or politics had some part in the 
discussion. The President was amazingly open and frank 
in his talk, but to the best of the knowledge of his intimate 



192 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

friends, that confidence was never abused. Either he 
always knew just whom to trust or else the way in which 
he put things and the surroundings of themselves im- 
pressed a pledge of discretion. At all events the frankness 
of discussion made one of the great charms of the meal. 
The food was always very simple — soup, hominy, and 
frequently Virginia ham, salad, and some light dessert. 
The rest of the family were usually at the table, except 
the younger children. 

About half-past two the President would go back to 
the business office and for the next hour or so devoted 
himself mainly to the technical part of his work as Chief 
Executive, the examining of reports, conferences with his 
various subordinates, writing of important letters, all of 
these handled with amazing swiftness and vigor. Indeed 
he got through the work in about one-third the time that 
the ordinary good executive would have taken. He had 
an astounding power of grasping all the essentials of a 
case and of going at once to the root of the matter. Again 
and again his subordinates would present elaborate and 
long reports over which they had worked for days. He 
would glance through them, and arrive, apparently, at a 
hasty decision. Later the subordinates would find that 
the President knew more about the report than they them- 
selves knew, and had seen further into all its bearings. 

Then about four o'clock or a little after came the 
sacred hour of exercise and recreation, of which I have 
spoken. If Congress were not in session, and the Presi- 
dent's family were at their summer home on Long Island, 
the group with whom he had walked or played tennis 
sometimes spent a long and wonderful evening on the 
back porch of the White House, where the President and 
his more intimate friends talked of literature, politics 



ROOSEVELT IN THE WHITE HOUSE 193 

and natural history, and the younger men listened and 
wondered at the sweep and accuracy of the talk. 

If, however, Congress were in session, or if it were in 
the social season, the return to the White House would 
mark the end of the recreation. At about eight o'clock 
came dinner, usually attended by familiar friends. After 
dinner the limits of the President's day were absolutely 
indefinite. He might have conferences with Senators and 
Cabinet officers to any hour. Frequently his subordinates 
would find they had an appointment at the White House 
at eleven or twelve at night or at one in the morning. 
These evening conferences usually dealt with more 
difficult and intricate questions where a few experts 
were consulted on the more important questions of policy, 
and where there was less of decision, more of discussion. 

It was a tremendous day's program to carry out, day 
after day, and year after year, but Roosevelt's mental 
and physical powers were more than equal to the strain. 
After seven and a half years crammed with incident and 
responsibility, he was just as vigorous, and just as brim- 
ful of the zest of the life as on the day when he first took 
up his duties as President. 

This was made possible not only by his own abun- 
dant vitality but by the complete happiness of his home 
life. On December 2, 1886, he had married his childhood 
friend, Edith Kermit Carow, and had found in her a 
wise and helpful companion amid his manifold activities. 



is 



CHAPTER XIII 

The First Term 

ROOSEVELT'S administration was crowded with 
achievements of national and of international 
*" significance. In the field of internal affairs the 
history of his relation to big business and to labor, the 
story of his conservation policy and the account of his 
work for the Navy are of such importance that they are 
treated in separate chapters of this book. But there were 
other matters of far-reaching consequence. 

The solid South had always been a stumbling block to 
Republican Presidents. To maintain the integrity of the 
party they had felt it necessary to select Federal office- 
holders from the small body of Southern Republicans. As 
a result, the choice often fell upon white politicans of the 
carpet-bagger type. This was inevitable, because the 
recollection of the Civil War and of the days of recon- 
struction still prevented white men of high standing from 
joining the Republican party. Roosevelt's policy in the 
matter of Southern appointments differed radically from 
that of his predecessors. He appreciated the dearth of 
material within his own party and therefore did not 
hesitate on more than one occasion to find his man among 
the Democrats. It was little more than a month after his 
accession to office that he appointed Thomas G. Jones to 
be a United States District Judge in Alabama, and George 
E. Koester as Collector of Internal Revenue in South 
Carolina, both of whom were Democrats of good standing 
and reputation in their respective communities. 

(194) 



THE FIRST TERM 195 

There can be no doubt that he would have been very 
glad to see political sectionalism put out of business by a 
break-up of the solid South; and the course upon which 
he thus embarked was well calculated to achieve this end. 
A display of fairness to the Southerners of the opposite 
party, coupled with his own personal popularity, would 
have gone far to create an entering wedge for Republican- 
ism in the South. 

But the President's own conception of fair dealing 
probably prevented the realization of this hope. He was 
not willing to refuse all recognition to the colored 
race in the matter of appointments. Before the question 
of colored appointments became acute, however, another 
incident occurred which cost him much of the support 
which might otherwise have been his in the Southern 
states. In October, 1901, while his new policy of practically 
non-partisan appointments was rapidly earning for him, 
the respect of the Southern voters, he invited Booker T. 
Washington to dine with him at the White House. 
Washington was the colored president of the Tuskegee 
Institute in Alabama and was by common consent the 
leader of thought and purpose among the colored people. 
The President admired him and numbered him among 
his friends. Wishing to consult him upon a subject of 
mutual interest, he had very naturally asked him to the 
White House. 

Mr. Francis E. Leupp, who was close to the President, 
arranged, upon Washington's suggestion, that he should 
make his visit without meeting any reporters. Unfor- 
tunately, however, for Mr. Washington's plan, his name 
was inscribed upon the record kept by the White House 
door-keepers. This record was open to the inspection of 
the newspaper representatives, and, as a consequence, 



196 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

there appeared in the next morning's Washington Post, 
at the bottom of an inside page, the obscure announce- 
ment: "Booker T. Washington, of Tuskegee, Alabama, 
dined with the President last evening." Had the Southern 
newspapers been content to let the matter rest there, 
nothing more would have come of it. Unfortunately, 
however, they hit upon this innocent news item and 
immediately set up an uproar. They accused the Presi- 
dent of intending to set up negro supremacy in the South, 
and of having made a stage play to secure the colored 
vote. The first accusation was disproved by the fact that 
the President had appointed to two responsible Federal 
offices members of the dominant race, although they were 
not of his own party. The second charge was equally 
absurd, for no one really believes that the colored man 
needs a share in the spoils of office to convert him to 
Republicanism. 

The President made no public statement in regard 
to the occurrence. But he received innumerable letters 
on the subject; some from friends who urged him to give 
the South a lesson by foisting as many negroes as possible 
upon it; others warning him never to set his foot on 
Southern soil so long as he was President. But all 
this clamor affected him not at all. Not long afterwards 
he named as Collector of the Port of Charleston, S. C, 
Doctor William D. Crum, an educated colored man of 
standing and character, with an excellent reputation 
among both races. This produced another outburst of 
excitement, but the President stood firm. He explained 
that he considered Crum entirely fit for the appointment, 
and that he should certainly not discriminate against 
him on account of his color. In a letter of November 26, 
1902, answering a vehement protest from a gentleman of 



THE FIRST TERM 197 

Charleston, he said; "The great majority of my appoint- 
ments in every state have been of white men. North and 
South alike it has been my sedulous endeavor to appoint 
only men of high character and good capacity, whether 
white or black. But it has been my consistent policy in 
every state where their numbers warranted it to recognize 
colored men of good repute and standing in making 
appointments to office." He persisted in this policy 
throughout his administration. When circumstances 
justified it he appointed to Federal office colored men of 
ability and of high character, but he frequently named 
a white Democrat when he believed that such a nomina- 
tion would best serve the interests of the country. 

Toward the end of 1902 there occurred an incident 
which illustrated his attitude toward the colored problem 
and also his characteristic way of meeting a difficult 
situation. Mrs. Minnie Cox had been for some years the 
colored postmistress at Indianola, Mississippi. A mob, 
inspired by a wave of race prejudice, compelled Mrs. 
Cox to resign her position and to leave the town. The 
matter was brought to the attention of the President. 
Of course the obvious thing to do was to assert the majesty 
of the law by sending Mrs. Cox back under an escort of 
United States troops. Roosevelt, however, adopted a 
much simpler expedient. He simply closed the post-office 
and by this means compelled the citizens of Indianola to 
go five miles to the next town to get their mail. 

Early in Roosevelt's administration rumors of fraud 
in the Post-Office Department had become more and more 
numerous. Finally Payne, the Postmaster General, 
carried the charges to the President. Payne suggested a 
quiet investigation which would spare the party the dis- 
grace and injury of public exposure. The President, 



198 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

however, took a different view of the situation. If there 
was dishonesty, he was determined to find it out and to 
punish the wrong-doers in the light of day. He argued, 
and rightly, that no amount of publicity could hurt the 
Republican party if they were honestly discharging the 
duty of cleaning their own house. The investigation was 
therefore undertaken and relentlessly carried through 
under the immediate supervision of Joseph L. Bristow, the 
Fourth Assistant Postmaster General, who was peculiarly 
qualified for the work both by experience and temper- 
ament. The President took a keen interest in it from the 
beginning, and constantly issued orders and made sug- 
gestions to the investigators. As special assistants to the 
Attorney-General he procured Charles J. Bonaparte and 
Holmes Conrad, the latter of whom was a Democrat to 
whom the uncovering of Republican wrong-doing was 
naturally a pleasant task. The result was a complete 
exposure of colossal frauds, and a cleansing of the Post- 
Office Department of which it stood in sore need. The 
President's judgment as to the effect of this washing of 
the party's dirty linen in public was vindicated by the 
result of the election of 1904. He had shown himself 
willing to pursue and chastise the rogues of his own 
fold, and the people, knowing that rogues were common 
to both parties, rejoiced to have a President who was able 
and anxious to hunt them impartially. 

Roosevelt rendered no greater service to the nation 
than the settlement of the great Anthracite Coal Strike 
in the fall of 1902. Without his intervention there is 
little doubt that there would have befallen the country 
a calamity very much more serious than any since the 
Civil War. 

The trouble between the operators and the miners of 



THE FIRST TERM 199 

the Pennsylvania anthracite region was an old story. In 
the fall of 1900, a strike had led to a temporary settlement 
which involved an increase of ten per cent in the miners' 
wages. Senator Hanna had been largely instrumental 
in effecting this agreement and he had wrung concessions 
from the operators by warning them that a stubborn 
attitude would, in the coming election, throw the 
miners into the arms of Bryan. By the spring of 1902 
the temporary arrangement had come to an end and 
the miners approached the operators with the request 
that the entire subject should be carefully considered and 
a final agreement reached. On May 8th, John Mitchell, 
president of the United Mine Workers of America, wrote 
the owners setting forth the specific demands of the 
miners. These were for a twenty per cent increase in 
wages, for an eight -hour day, and for a certain method 
of payment by weight. In his letter he offered to submit 
the controversy to arbitration by Archbishop Ireland, 
Bishop Potter and a third arbitrator, to be chosen by 
these two. The operators, however, refused to discuss 
the question of wages and hours any further. Accordingly, 
on May 12th, the great strike began, and by June 2d, 
147,000 men were out of work. Although the questions 
of pay and of hours of labor were at issue between the 
contending parties, the real source of the trouble and the 
fundamental cause of dispute was the failure of the owners 
to recognize the authority of the United Mine Workers 
of America to speak for the miners. They were willing 
to treat with the miners individually, but refused to deal 
with them collectively through their accredited agents. 
Through the summer the strike did not cause very 
serious inconvenience. The strikers were supported partly 
by their own savings and partly by funds contributed to 



200 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

them by the bituminous miners and other wage earners. 
The ordinary reserve supplies of coal prevented any 
serious injury to industry for some time. But as fall 
approached the situation grew very serious indeed. By 
October, coal which usually sold for three dollars a ton 
was selling for fifteen or twenty dollars, while the poor 
had to pay as much as a cent a pound at retail. Soft coal 
too had risen in price three or four hundred per cent. The 
cost of the necessaries of life began to increase materially 
since coal played a controlling part in their manufacture. 
Unless some action were taken speedily, hundreds of 
thousands were threatened with privation and death for 
lack of fuel. 

The coal fields were owned to a large extent by the 
eastern railroads, and these in turn were controlled by a 
small body of capitalists at the head of whom stood J. 
Pierpont Morgan. There was some disorder at the mines 
during the summer, and Governor Stone of Pennsylvania 
called out the state militia to suppress it. The operators 
took the position that if properly protected, they could 
run the mines and produce as much coal as the public 
needed. But the presence of the troops had no effect on 
the mining of coal and the situation remained as bad as 
ever. Both sides were obdurate; each was determined 
not to give in to the other. 

Roosevelt felt very keenly his responsibility in the 
matter. He realized that whatever action he took could 
not be in accordance with any clearly expressed consti- 
tutional power; but he was determined to take some 
action. During the summer it was suggested to him that 
he should acquaint himself with the facts of the situation 
so as to be ready to act promptly when the time came. 
He accepted the suggestion immediately and within a few 



THE FIRST TERM 201 

minutes had telegraphed to Carroll D. Wright, the 
Commissioner of Labor, directing him to make the 
necessary investigation and report. 

When October brought the first signs of cold weather 
and there still seemed no indication of a settlement of the 
strike, the President himself took a hand in the situation. 
He asked representatives of both sides to meet him in 
Washington to see whether some agreement could be 
arrived at. He had with him at the meeting Attorney- 
General Knox, George B. Cortelyou, his private secretary, 
and Carroll D. Wright, the Commissioner of Labor. The 
operators were represented by the presidents of the 
several railroads interested, and the miners by John 
Mitchell, the president of their organization. Roosevelt 
began the meeting by stating that he disclaimed "any 
right or duty to intervene in this way upon legal grounds 
or upon any official relation that he bore to the situation," 
but that it was his earnest desire that the conference 
might result in some kind of a settlement. 

Mitchell immediately answered that he and his friends 
would be only too glad to submit the whole matter to 
arbitration by a tribunal to be named by the President. 
The meeting then adjourned until three o'clock to give 
the operators an opportunity to consider and prepare 
their replies. When they returned at the appointed hour 
they each had typewritten statements from which they 
read their answers. George F. Baer, president of the 
Reading Company — the largest single operator in the 
field — made the first statement which presented sub- 
stantially the same views as the others. He described and 
greatly exaggerated the lawlessness of the strikers and 
reminded the President that it was his constitutional 
duty to send United States troops on request of the 



202 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Governor or Legislature of a state, to suppress domestic 
violence. "You see," he said, "there is a lawful way to 
secure coal for the public. The duty of the hour is not to 
waste time negotiating with the fomenters of this anarchy 
and insolent defiance of law, but to do as was done in the 
War of the Rebellion, restore the majesty of the law." 
He concluded by offering to submit any controversy in a 
given locality to arbitration by the judges of the local 
court of common pleas. The operators turned a deaf 
ear to the proposition that the whole matter should be 
submitted to a commission to be appointed by the 
President, and the meeting broke up with apparently no 
progress made toward an agreement. 

The President was justly indignant at the attitude of 
the operators. "They came down in a most insolent frame 
of mind," he said, "refused to talk of arbitration or other 
accommodation of any kind, and used language that was 
insulting to the miners and offensive to me." But this 
statement was made more than ten years later. At the 
time he concealed his resentment and continued his efforts 
to effect a settlement. The attitude of the operators at 
this meeting gave rise to an outburst of wrath from all 
parts of the country. The people fully appreciated what 
a winter without coal would be and their anger against 
the small body of men who stood in the way of a recon- 
ciliation showed itself in countless ways. Grover Cleve- 
land wrote to the President, approving the course 
which he had pursued and expressing his indignation at 
the conduct of the operators. The President at once 
wrote to Mr. Cleveland, asking if he would consent to 
serve as chairman of the Arbitration or Investigating 
Commission which would probably be appointed. This 
Cleveland consented to do. 



THE FIRST TERM 203 

But the President did not rely upon finally securing 
the operators' assent to arbitration. He was prepared to 
go to very great lengths in order to save the country from 
a coal famine. He accordingly sent for Major-General 
Schofield, in whom he had great confidence, and told him 
that if the arbitration scheme failed, he would send the 
United States Army to the coal fields under the command 
of the General with instructions to dispossess the opera- 
tors and to run the mines as a receiver until the President's 
Commission should make its report. He had no right 
under the Constitution to send troops into Pennsylvania 
unless the Governor or the State Legislature asked for 
them. Accordingly he sent for Senator Quay, and, without 
telling him the details of his plan, arranged that whenever 
he gave word from Washington Governor Stone would 
request Federal intervention. He was now ready to 
avert disaster, whether or not the operators consented to 
arbitrate. 

Shortly after the abortive conference of October 3d, 
Elihu Root, the Secretary of War, discussed the matter 
further with Mr. Morgan in New York, and finally 
Morgan, on October 13th, after an interview with the 
President, agreed to submit the case to arbitration. The 
operators, however, demanded that they should be allowed 
to dictate the way in which the Commission should be 
made up. It must have five members : an army engineer, 
a mining expert, an eminent sociologist, a mining engineer, 
and a United States judge from the Eastern District of 
Pennsylvania. The President was very anxious to appoint 
Cleveland to the Commission, rightly thinking that this 
would establish popular confidence in the fairness of their 
findings, but the operators were obstinate and Cleveland's 
name had to be dropped. The President also felt that 



204 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

some representative of labor should serve on the Com- 
mission, but to this the owners positively refused to agree. 
After two hours of argument a solution suddenly occurred 
to the President. He announced that he agreed to the 
terms laid down by the operators. Accordingly he ap- 
pointed as Commissioners, General John M. Wilson, an 
army engineer; Thomas H. Watkins, a mining expert; 
Edward W. Parker, a mining engineer, and Judge George 
Gray. When it came to the eminent sociologist, the 
President took the opportunity to make the appointment 
which fairness to the miners demanded. He named Mr. 
Edward E. Clark, president of the Brotherhood of Railway 
Conductors, adding to the public statement of the ap- 
pointment, "The President assuming that for the pur- 
poses of such a Commission, the term "sociologist" 
means a man who has thought and studied deeply on 
social questions and has practically applied his know- 
ledge." 

Both sides had agreed to abide by the awards of the 
Commission and the representatives of the miners had 
agreed that their men would go back to work immediately. 
This they did on October 23d. On March 18, 1903, the 
Commission filed its report containing its findings and 
awards. The miners received a ten per cent increase in 
pay, a nine -hour day was established, and substantial 
recognition was secured for the United Mine Workers of 
America. Since this award, which was loyally accepted 
by both sides, there has been industrial peace in the 
anthracite coal region. 

When Roosevelt had succeeded to the Presidency 
upon McKinley's death, he had, as has been already 
stated, persuaded all of McKinley's Cabinet to retain 
their portfolios, but with the passage of time, changes 



THE FIRST TERM 205 

necessarily occurred. The first of these was on December 
17, 1901, when Henry C. Payne took the place of Charles 
Emory Smith as Postmaster-General. The appointment 
of Mr. Payne caused considerable surprise. He was a 
party manager of experience but with none of the inde- 
pendent tendencies which the President was supposed to 
favor. It was, however, this very fact which led Roose- 
velt to select Payne for the position. He felt that his 
Cabinet needed a practical politician and that Payne, who 
had been chairman of the Republican National Executive 
Committee, would fill this need. 

On January 8, 1902, occurred the second change in his 
official family. Lyman J. Gage resigned the Treasury 
portfolio and Leslie M. Shaw, of Iowa, was selected to 
take his place. Shaw was a successful banker who had 
made a fortune by finding Eastern money for Western 
mortgages. During the free-silver agitation his convic- 
tions and his best interest alike had driven him into 
politics as the supporter of a sound gold currency. He 
became Governor of Iowa and it seemed that in the year 
1904 he might become a candidate for the Presidency. 
But McKinley's untimely death put an end to his Presi- 
dential chances, although it afforded him the opportunity 
of holding a Cabinet position. He was a great man for 
getting things done, for cutting red-tape and for surmount- 
ing apparently insurmountable obstacles and for this 
reason Roosevelt liked him and appointed him. 

John D. Long, McKinley's Secretary of the Navy, 
under whom Roosevelt had served in 1897 and 1898, 
resigned early in the year 1902. Personal sorrow and 
anxiety had made him anxious to return to the quiet life of 
an ordinary citizen. In his place the President appointed 
William H. Moody, of Massachusetts, whom he had 



206 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

known as a member of Congress, and with whom he was 
already on terms of friendship. Moody had served in 
Congress as a member of the House Committee on 
Appropriations, and had taken a special interest in naval 
affairs, so that he appeared to be well qualified to act as 
the President's assistant in carrying out a program for 
increasing America's strength on the high seas. 

The new Department of Commerce and Labor was 
created by an act of Congress, approved by the President 
on February 14, 1903. Two days later he appointed 
George B. Cortelyou to be its first Secretary. Cortelyou 
had been private secretary to McKinley and had been 
retained in his position by the new President. He had a 
genius for organization which was particularly valuable 
in starting the new department on its way. 

During the year 1904, a number of further changes took 
place in the Cabinet. Elihu Root, the Secretary of War, 
having completed the military reforms which had been be- 
gun under his supervision, resigned to resume his law prac- 
tice in New York City, and was succeeded by William H. 
Taft, whose reputation as a Federal judge and as Governor- 
General of the Philippines certainly justified his selection. 
In this year, too, Philander C. Knox resigned the Attorney- 
Generalship to accept an appointment by the Governor of 
Pennsylvania to the United States Senate. Moody moved 
over from the Navy Department to take Knox's place 
and was himself succeeded by Paul Morton, a railroad 
man who had commended himself to the President by 
his fairness and ability in helping to put a stop to the 
rebate evil. The appointments of Moody and Morton, 
together with that of Victor H. Metcalf, as Secretary of 
Commerce and Labor, were announced on June 24, 1904, 
the day after the President had received the nomination 



THE FIRST TERM 207 

for a second term. On October 10th of the same year, 
Robert J. Wynne succeeded Henry C. Payne as Post- 
master-General. By the end of 1904, therefore, Roosevelt 
had a Cabinet whose composition had changed almost 
entirely during the three years of his Presidency. 

With the exception of the Coal Strike, it was our 
foreign policy which furnished the most striking incidents 
of Roosevelt's first term. Matters gravely affecting our 
relations with Cuba, Santo Domingo, Venezuela, Turkey, 
Great Britain and Panama, came up in rapid succession 
and were necessarily disposed of to a large extent, and 
often wholly, by the President himself. "In foreign 
affairs," he says, "the principle from which we never 
deviated was to have the nation behave toward other 
nations precisely as a strong, honorable and upright man 
behaves in dealing with his fellow-men." 

Ever since the Spanish War our relations with Cuba 
had formed a difficult and pressing problem. The Span- 
iards had withdrawn shortly after the termination of the 
war, leaving the island under the jurisdiction of General 
Leonard Wood as Military Governor. There had followed 
a Constitutional Convention composed of delegates 
selected at a general election. The United States had 
formally disclaimed any intention of exercising sovereignty 
over Cuba, and had expressed its determination to leave 
the island as soon as its pacification was completed. We 
were anxious to carry out this pledge as quickly as 
possible; but we appreciated the fact that Cuba stood in 
a peculiar relation to us. By an amendment to the Army 
Appropriation Bill of March 2, 1901, known as the Piatt 
Amendment, the President was directed to leave the 
control of Cuba to its people so soon as the Cubans should 
adopt a constitution which should, among other things, 



208 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

grant to the United States the right to intervene for the 
protection of Cuban independence, and should further 
give us rights in certain naval stations on the island. The 
Cubans were assured that it was not our intention to 
meddle in their affairs except on just and substantial 
grounds. On June 12, 1901, the Constitutional Conven- 
tion completed a constitution which embodied the pro- 
visions of the Piatt Amendment. On the last day of 1901 
a general election of national officers was held, and finally, 
on May 20, 1902, the United States withdrew and the 
government was formally transferred to the inhabitants 
of Cuba. 

Roosevelt believed that there had been two great 
moral issues in the campaigns of 1896, 1898 and 1900, 
"the imperative need of a sound and honest currency and 
the need after 1898 of meeting in manful and straight- 
forward fashion the extra-territorial problems arising from 
the Spanish War." With respect to Cuba he felt a peculiar 
sense of obligation, to which he called attention in his 
first message to Congress. "Cuba," he said, "has in her 
constitution affirmed what we desired, that she should 
stand, in international matters, in closer and more friendly 
relations with us than with any other power; and we are 
bound by every consideration of honor and expediency to 
pass commercial measures in the interest of her material 
well-being." He therefore asked for a substantial 
reduction in the tariff duties on Cuban imports into the 
United States. But for two years it was impossible to 
carry this plan into execution. The principal subject of 
import from Cuba was sugar, and the American beet and 
cane-sugar planters objected strongly to a reduction of the 
tariff which would necessarily affect their business. With 
them were various farmers' associations and those who 



THE FIRST TERM 209 

favored a high tariff on general principles. The American 
Sugar Refining Company, on the other hand, favored 
reciprocity with Cuba because it would enable them to 
get raw sugar for refining at a lower price. 

The interests opposed to reciprocity were strong 
enough to prevent favorable action by Congress, and the 
President accordingly sent a special message urging the 
passage of a reciprocity bill. At the next session he again 
asked for action in his annual message, but still there was 
no response from Congress. He had set his heart, however, 
upon reciprocity with Cuba and was determined to carry 
it through as a measure of justice to the island. 
Finding Congress obdurate, he negotiated a treaty with 
the Cuban Government providing for certain mutual 
reductions in the import duties of the two countries. The 
Senate failed to act on this treaty at the current session 
and was therefore convened by the President in special 
session on March 5, 1903. After two weeks' discussion 
the treaty was ratified with certain amendments and with 
the curious provision that it should not go into effect 
until approved by Congress as a whole. Since the special 
session included only the Senate and not the House this 
meant that the matter was left in abeyance until the fall. 
Without waiting until the beginning of the regular fall 
session, the President called an extra session of Congress 
on November 9, 1903, and sent to them a message strongly 
urging the approval of the treaty. He again called at- 
tention to our moral obligations to Cuba, and to the 
economic advantages which the treaty would secure for 
us. The House passed the bill to approve the treaty by 
an overwhelming vote, but the Senate, although they had 
ratified the treaty itself, were reluctant to take the 
necessary final step. At last, however, they passed the 

14 



210 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

bill on December 16, 1903, and reciprocity with Cuba 
became an accomplished fact. 

Roosevelt had been in office only a little over a year 
when there came a clear-cut opportunity for the appli- 
cation of the Monroe Doctrine. 

In 1896 the Government of Venezuela had borrowed 
nine and a half million dollars from a German bank for 
the building of a railroad. When most of the interest on 
this sum remained unpaid in 1901, the German Govern- 
ment took up the cudgels in behalf of the bank. A demand 
was made upon Venezuela for the payment of the interest, 
together with damages for losses sustained by German 
settlers during the Venezuelan Revolution of 1898. Pres- 
ident Castro procrastinated as long as possible. Finally 
the Germans decided to establish what they called a 
"pacific blockade." In this they were backed rather half- 
heartedly by Great Britain, who was pressing for the 
payment of claims due to British subjects amounting 
to about a million and a half dollars. John Hay, Roose- 
velt's Secretary of State, spent a year in trying to persuade 
the blockaders that they were unjustifiably interfering 
with the rights of neutral nations. He also suggested 
arbitration. But Germany was anxious to push matters 
to the limit and to make use of her new navy. On Decem- 
ber 8, 1902, both Germany and Great Britain severed 
diplomatic relations with Venezuela and on the next day 
sunk three Venezuelan warships just off the coast of that 
country. Four days later they bombarded and reduced 
to pulp the small fort of Puerto Cabello. 

Roosevelt felt that the situation was serious. He knew 
that the British would be willing to arbitrate and that 
the real aggressor was Germany. He accordingly sent 
for the German Ambassador, Dr. Holleben, and told him 



THE FIRST TERM 211 

that unless Germany consented to arbitrate, Admiral 
Dewey with the American squadron would be sent, ten 
days later, to the Venezuelan coast to prevent the taking 
of Venezuelan territory by Germany. Dr. Holleben began 
to argue the question but the President explained that 
the time for argument was past. The German Ambas- 
sador left, and for a week nothing happened. Then Dr. 
Holleben called on the President again but said nothing 
about the Venezuelan matter. As he started to leave 
Roosevelt stopped him and asked him whether he had 
heard anything from his government. He said that he 
had not. "Then," said Roosevelt, "I shall instruct 
Admiral Dewey to sail one day earlier than I had 
originally intended." This brought the Ambassador to 
earth very quickly. The President explained that no one 
knew of his former message to the Kaiser, that no one 
need know about it, and that the Kaiser would receive 
full credit if he consented to arbitrate. Thirty-six hours 
later Dr. Holleben returned to say that the Kaiser would 
be glad to submit to arbitration. Both Great Britain and 
Germany united, on December 20th, in asking the 
President to act as sole arbitrator. But he induced them 
to refer their dispute to the Hague Tribunal and fulfilled 
his promise to Dr. Holleben by complimenting the Kaiser 
on his support of the cause of international arbitration. 

The account of the President's interviews with Dr. 
Holleben was not made public until years afterwards, 
when friendly relations between the two countries had 
ceased. When the European squadron of the United 
States Navy visited Kiel in June, 1903, we may readily 
imagine the amusement with which Roosevelt must have 
read Emperor William's speech expressing warm sentiments 
of friendship for himself and for the American people. 



212 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

In the affair of Santo Domingo the Monroe Doctrine 
was again called into operation. Santo Domingo was 
always in a chronic state of revolution. It was the prac- 
tice of the revolutionaries to seize the ports with their 
custom houses and to pledge future import duties as 
security for loans made to them by European powers. 
This kind of high finance had utterly demoralized the 
island. On one occasion there were for some weeks two 
simultaneous rival governments, against each of which a 
revolution was being carried on. For part of this time one 
of the governments was quartered at sea in a small gun- 
boat while still claiming the attributes of sovereignty. 

By September, 1904, Santo Domingo's total debt was 
over thirty-two million dollars, and she had in sight an 
income of only half a million with which to meet, during 
the coming year, charges of five times that sum. Most of 
this money had been borrowed from European creditors, 
whose governments threatened to force repayment of the 
loans. There were two ways to do this — one was to 
establish a "pacific blockade," which is on its face an 
absurd contradiction in terms, while the other was to 
seize and conduct the custom house and to apply the 
duties thus collected to the payment of the debt. The 
United States had assumed a position with regard to the 
smaller American republics which made it impossible to 
permit any such seizure as that suggested. Roosevelt 
accordingly arranged on his own account with the de 
facto Government of Santo Domingo, that the United 
States should collect the duties and should pay forty- 
five per cent of them to Santo Domingo, and fifty-five 
per cent to the various creditors. The carrying out of 
this arrangement was of course to be insured by the 
necessary protection of American armed forces. The 



THE FIRST TERM 213 

Senate refused to ratify the treaty which embodied this 
agreement; but the President succeeded in accomplishing 
his object nevertheless. The President of Santo Domingo 
named a Receiver of Customs suggested to him by 
President Roosevelt, and this Receiver collected duties 
under the protection of the United States Navy, which of 
course acted in the matter under the orders of the Pres- 
ident as its Commander-in-Chief. The Senate, realizing 
that the President had got the better of them, finally, on 
February 25, 1907, ratified a treaty with Santo Domingo 
which substantially accomplished the purpose which 
Roosevelt had in mind. As a result, the creditors began to 
receive their money, and the Santo Domingans received 
more from their forty-five per cent share than they had 
received in the old days when all of the duties went to 
them direct. 

In speaking of this matter shortly before the ratifica- 
tion of the treaty by the Senate, the President said: "I 
was immensely amused when at a professional peace 
meeting the other day they incidentally alluded to me as 
having 'made war' on Santo Domingo. I feel like 
paraphrasing Patrick Henry: 'if that is war, make the 
most of it.' The war I have made literally consists in 
having loaned them a Collector of Customs at their 
request." 

In the summer of 1903, a rumor reached Washington 
that Magelssen, the United States Vice-Consul at Beirut, 
Syria, had been assassinated. The President immediately 
ordered the European squadron to proceed to Beirut. 
The promptness of this action caused considerable aston- 
ishment at the time; but the basis of his judgment was 
sound. Had the rumor come from a civilized country he 
could have secured an immediate report of the situation 



214 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

through diplomatic channels, but he knew that weeks 
would elapse before any information could be elicited 
from the Turkish authorities, and he rightly reasoned 
that nothing would instil a desire for fairness so quickly 
in the Turkish heart as the appearance of United States 
men-of-war. Fortunately, the rumor appeared to have 
been without foundation, but the discovery of this fact 
was no doubt due in large measure to the promptness with 
which the President had indicated his determination to 
press matters to a conclusion if necessary. 

Under Roosevelt's administration the cause of arbi- 
tration flourished. The case of the United States against 
Mexico in 1902 was the first case ever referred to the 
Hague Tribunal. This involved a dispute over the Pious 
Fund of the Californias — a trust fund started by the 
Jesuits in the seventeenth century for the conversion of 
the California Indians, which had been administered at 
one time by the King of Spain, and later by the Govern- 
ment of Mexico. After the purchase of the State of Cali- 
fornia by the United States in 1848, Mexico had failed to 
pay the Catholic bishops of California their share of the 
interest of the trust fund. The Hague Court decided in 
favor of the American bishops, awarding them a large 
sum of accrued interest, together with a future annuity 
of about $40,000. 

It was during this period too, that the Alaskan Bound- 
ary question was submitted to a mixed British and 
American Commission, and was thus finally settled to the 
satisfaction of both disputants. There were also concluded 
with Great Britain and with most of the other great 
nations, arbitration treaties specifically agreeing to arbi- 
trate all matters except questions affecting territorial 
integrity, national honor and vital national interest. 



THE FIRST TERM 215 

Roosevelt's position in regard to this matter of arbitration 
was clear. He was anxious to avoid hostilities wherever 
possible and to increase the power and prestige of the 
Hague Tribunal, but he stated emphatically his disbelief 
in "making universal arbitration treaties which neither 
the makers, nor any one else, would for a moment dream 
of keeping." In this, as in all other things, he faced the 
facts and strove only for what he called "realizable 
ideals." 

By far the most important matter affecting our 
international relations during Roosevelt's administration 
was the series of events leading up to the digging of the 
Panama Canal. These events are, in themselves, so 
interesting and have exercised such a profound influence 
upon the history of this country, that they are treated of 
separately in the chapter which follows. 



CHAPTER XIV 

The Panama Canal 

WE owe to Theodore Roosevelt the Panama 
Canal. The statement that he built it after 
four hundred years of conversation is almost 
literally true. In his speech at the University of California 
on March 23, 1911, he said: "I am interested in the 
Panama Canal because I started it. If I had followed 
traditional, conservative methods, I should have sub- 
mitted a dignified state paper of probably two hundred 
pages to the Congress, and the debate would have been 
going on yet. But I took the Canal Zone, and let Congress 
debate, and while the debate goes on the canal does also." 

The canal is the greatest tangible result of his Presi- 
dency. He accomplished his purpose because he was 
intensely interested in having the canal built; because he 
beat down the powerful opposition to the construction 
of any canal; and, above all, because, faced with a diffi- 
cult and complicated situation, he was willing to take the 
responsibility of positive action. 

His instant recognition of the Republic of Panama, 
and his use of the naval forces of the United States to 
prevent Colombia from landing troops to quell the 
rebellion has been the subject of much adverse criticism. 
There is now pending in the Senate a treaty negotiated 
between the present administration and Colombia which 
virtually recognizes that the action taken by the United 
States under the direction of President Roosevelt was not 
justifiable. Roosevelt himself never doubted the moral 

(216) 



THE PANAMA CANAL 217 

justification for his act. Indeed, he would have regarded 
any other course than the one he took as essentially 
immoral. 

The issue can be shortly stated: Had the Republic of 
Colombia so acted toward the people of Panama and the 
United States as to justify the United States in instantly 
recognizing the revolutionary government of Panama 
as the de facto government of the Isthmus? I recognize 
that many publicists and authorities on international law 
answer this question in the negative. Personally I believe 
that President Roosevelt and his great Secretary of State, 
John Hay, were right. 

By the Treaty of 1846 with New Grenada, the country 
then in control of the Isthmus, the United States was 
guaranteed free and open right of way across the Isthmus 
by any mode of communication. In return, the United 
States guaranteed the neutrality of Panama with a view 
of preserving free transit. Furthermore, the United States 
guaranteed the sovereignty of New Grenada over the 
Isthmus, this last and important clause being to protect 
this important strip of territory from the encroachments 
of any foreign power, especially Great Britain. 

In 1850 the United States and Great Britain entered 
into the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. This treaty provided 
for a canal to be constructed by a private corporation 
under the political control of Great Britain and the United 
States and of such other powers as they might unite with 
them. On the organization of the French Company by 
De Lesseps, President Hayes took the position that any 
canal across the Isthmus should be under the control of 
the United States, and Secretaries Blaine and Freling- 
huysen made efforts to secure a modification of the 
Clayton-Bulwer Treaty. In his first term President 



218 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Cleveland reverted to the policy of a neutralized canal 
under international guarantee. During Cleveland's second 
administration, however, Olney, as Secretary of State, 
declared that the stipulations of the Treaty of 1850 should 
be modified and that a direct appeal should be made to 
Great Britain for a reconsideration of the whole matter. 
When McKinley made Hay Secretary of State, that 
statesman negotiated with Great Britain what is known 
as the original Hay-Pauncefote Treaty. This treaty, as 
drafted, gave the United States the right to construct and 
maintain the canal, but would have obliged the United 
States, even in case of war, to allow the canal to be used 
by the fleets of an enemy. It also practically invited 
foreign powers to join with this country in guaranteeing 
the neutrality of the canal. At the time this treaty was 
negotiated and sent to the Senate, Roosevelt was Governor 
of New York. He wrote a long letter to Secretary Hay, 
protesting against these two features of the proposed 
treaty. The Senate amended the treaty and the British 
Government refused to accept the amendments. Hay, 
however, then succeeded in negotiating the famous Hay- 
Pauncefote Treaty which was transmitted to the Senate 
by President Roosevelt on December 5, 1901, and ratified 
by that body on December 16th. It provided that the 
United States alone should build the canal and assume 
the responsibility of neutralizing and safeguarding it. The 
Hay-Pauncefote Treaty left the United States free to 
build the canal, provided we could come to an arrange- 
ment with the country which owned the territory through 
which the canal would pass. 

For some time two possible routes had been under 
consideration, one through Nicaragua, the other through 
the Isthmus at Panama. A commission, under Admiral 



THE PANAMA CANAL 219 

Walker, had made an exhaustive examination of the 
subject and reported in favor of the Nicaraguan route. 
At the same time, however, the commission had reported 
that the value of the French Panama Canal Company's 
property and rights on the Isthmus was only $40,000,000, 
and not $109,000,000 which was the company's own 
estimate. In January, 1902, the House of Representatives 
passed a bill directing the construction of the canal by 
the Nicaraguan route. The French Panama Canal 
Company, however, signified that they would accept 
$40,000,000 for their property and rights. The Senate 
amended the bill so as to provide for the purchase of the 
French Panama Canal Company's rights for $40,000,000, 
the acquisition from Colombia, at a fair price, of a strip 
six miles wide across the Isthmus, and the construction 
of the canal by the Panama route. As amended, the bill 
became a law on June 28, 1902. 

All that remained, therefore, was to negotiate a treaty 
with Colombia. At the time, the government of Colombia 
was centered in the person of Vice-President Maroquin, 
who was acting as absolute dictator. This worthy, on 
July 31, 1900, had seized the person of President San- 
clamente, had imprisoned him a few miles from the 
capital, and had then declared himself possessed of 
supreme executive authority because of the absence of the 
President from the capital. Furthermore, on the ground 
that public order was disturbed, as it certainly was, because 
he had disturbed it, he assumed to himself all legislative 
power. 

His representative in Washington was Dr. Herran, 
the Charge d'Affaires of the Colombia Legation. After 
several months of bargaining, Secretary Hay and Dr. 
Herran succeeded in negotiating the Hay-Herran Treaty, 



220 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

which was reported to the Senate on January 27, 1903, 
and ratified by that body on March 27th. Under the 
terms of this treaty Colombia was to receive $10,000,000 
for a strip of territory across the Isthmus six miles wide. 
The United States further obligated itself, after nine years, 
to pay Colombia $250,000.00 annually. Having been 
signed by Dr. Herran, Maroquin's representative, it is 
inconceivable that Maroquin did not know and acquiesce 
in the terms of the treaty. The dictator, however, 
determined to go back on his bargain. He first tried to 
force the French Panama Company to pay him $10,000,- 
000 out of the $40,000,000 which they were to receive 
from the United States. This the company refused to do. 
Thereupon Maroquin and his friends concocted an- 
other scheme which they believed would net them still 
larger returns. The original grant to the Panama Com- 
pany was to have expired in 1904. The rights of the 
company, however, had been extended to 1910. The new 
plan of this precious lot of Bogotan brigands was to 
declare the extension of the Panama Company's rights 
void. As a result, in 1904 all the rights of the Panama 
Company would vest in Colombia, and they believed they 
would thereby obtain not only the $10,000,000 promised 
by the United States, and anything more that they could 
induce the United States to pay, but the $40,000,000 which 
the United States was willing to pay the Panama Com- 
pany. In order to carry out this plan, the Colombian 
Senate, consisting entirely of puppets of Maroquin, was 
called together. This body unanimously rejected the 
Hay-Herran Treaty on August 12, 1903. 

If any one has any doubt of the statement that the 
Colombian Senators were merely puppets of Maroquin, 
that doubt should be dispelled by what happened sub- 



THE PANAMA CANAL 221 

sequently. After the Panama revolution was an accom- 
plished fact, Maroquin, through a prominent Colombian 
then in Washington, suggested that if the United States 
would land troops to preserve Colombian sovereignty on 
the Isthmus, he would declare martial law, and by virtue 
of the constitutional authority vested in him when public 
order was disturbed, would approve the ratification of the 
Hay-Herran Treaty by his own decree or: — "If the 
Government of the United States prefers, we will call 
an extra session of Congress — with new and friendly mem- 
bers — next May to approve the treaty." 

The rejection of the treaty as the first step to secure 
to Colombia the $40,000,000 promised to the Canal 
Company, while doubtless highly satisfactory to Maroquin 
and his coterie at Bogota, was not at all satisfactory to the 
people of Panama. At one time Panama had been inde- 
pendent. Prior to 1886, she had had self-government 
under Colombia, but since that time she had been gov- 
erned directly from Bogota, that capital being situated 
fifteen days' journey from the city of Panama. 

The history of Panama during the previous fifty- 
seven years, ever since the Treaty of 1846 with New 
Grenada, had been one long series of disturbances and 
revolutions. In his message of December 7, 1903, Roose- 
velt detailed fifty-three revolutions, rebellions, insurrec- 
tions, riots and outbreaks. These disturbances, instead 
of tending to decrease, were apparently on the increase. 
Throughout this period, the United States constantly 
had to interfere to preserve order, protect her own interests 
in the railroad on the Isthmus and preserve Colombian 
authority. Had it not been for the armed protection of 
the United States, it is probable that Colombia would 
have lost control over the Isthmus years before. Roosevelt 



222 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

himself writes that— "in 1856, in 1860, in 1873, in 1885, 
in 1901 and again in 1902, sailors and marines from the 
United States war ships were forced to land in order to 
patrol the Isthmus, to protect life and property and to see 
that the transit across the Isthmus was kept open." No 
less than four times between 1861 and 1900 the Colombian 
Government had asked the United States Government 
to land troops to protect Colombia's interests and main- 
tain order. 

The rejection of the Hay-Herran Treaty by Maroquin 
placed the following alternatives before the United States : 

1. Accept the situation and continue conversations 
with Maroquin, or turn again to the Nicaraguan route. 

2. Carry out the terms of the Hay-Herran Treaty by 
seizing the strip across the Isthmus ceded by the treaty, 
and proceed to construct the canal. 

3. Encourage a revolution on the Isthmus. 
Roosevelt believed that the third course was immoral 

and therefore unthinkable. If a revolution came, well and 
good, but the United States could be no party to its 
encouragement. On October 10th he wrote to Dr. Albert 
Shaw, of the Review of Reviews: "I cast aside the 
proposition at this time to foment the secession of Panama. 
Whatever other governments can do, the United States 
can not go into the securing, by such underhand means, 
the cession. Privately I freely say to you that I should be 
delighted if Panama were an independent state, or if it 
made itself so at this moment; but for me to say so 
publicly would amount to an instigation of a revolt, 
and therefore I can not say it." 

The first course appealed to him as also immoral, 
though the immorality was of a different kind — the 
shirking of a moral obligation. The world needed a canal 



THE PANAMA CANAL 223 

across the Isthmus. The United States had taken the 
position that she would not allow other nations to build 
the canal; therefore she was under obligation to build 
it herself. Colombia, while unquestionably possessing 
the sovereignty over the Isthmus, not being financially 
able to build the canal, was not merely morally, but, 
under international law, legally obliged to let the United 
States build the canal, provided the United States 
offered her fair terms. For it must be remembered that 
sovereignty has its limitations; no nation, merely because 
it is sovereign over a specific territory can permanently 
prevent that territory from being used in a manner 
essential to the welfare of all nations. Furthermore, the 
Government of the United States had actually made with 
the only government existing in Colombia, the Dictator 
Maroquin, a treaty, and the dictator had repudiated 
that treaty. Finally, the people of the Isthmus were a 
unit in wanting the United States to act. To adopt the 
first course would have been to indefinitely postpone the 
construction of the canal and therefore to have shirked a 
positive moral duty resting on this country. To continue 
to negotiate with Colombia was for the United States 
to allow herself to be blackmailed into paying an un- 
reasonable price for the privilege of constructing the 
canal. Even if such a course was thinkable, any further 
negotiation with Colombia would have placed the United 
States in the position of countenancing Maroquin's 
attempt to delay matters until he had an excuse to con- 
fiscate the rights of the French Company — a proceeding 
which would have involved us with France. 

Roosevelt's great quality as an executive was that he 
never hesitated to take positive action if he believed such 
action right. He had no doubt that the second course 



224 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

above outlined was the correct course to take, and he 
therefore drafted a message to Congress in which he 
advocated seizing the Isthmus and constructing the canal. 

Events, however, rendered such a course of action 
unnecessary. The Panamanians, to a man, wanted the 
canal. They also wanted to sever their connections with 
Colombia. They were tired of being a milch cow for the 
Bogotan politicians. Through the summer of 1903 the 
papers were constantly representing this feeling. Revolu- 
tion was generally and openly spoken of on the Isthmus. 
Roosevelt was of course aware of this sentiment. On the 
16th of October, Captain Humphrey and Lieutenant 
Murphy returned from Panama and reported to the 
President that a revolution would certainly occur, at the 
end of October, after the Colombian Senate had adjourned 
and the last hope for reconsideration and ratification of the 
treaty had disappeared. Upon receipt of this report 
Roosevelt immediately ordered American ships to proceed 
to the Isthmus. 

No revolution in South America or elsewhere can be 
organized without money. There is no evidence that the 
Panama Canal Company supplied the necessary funds, 
but they certainly had every incentive. They stood to 
lose $40,000,000 and the confiscation of all their property 
on the Isthmus if the Colombian Government continued 
its control over Panama. M. Philippe Bunau-Varilla, a 
Frenchman who had been in the employ of the old Pan- 
ama Canal Company, and who was a resident of the 
Isthmus, turned up in Washington on October 10th, 
having recently arrived from Paris. He saw the President 
and Secretary Hay and told them, as he told every one 
else, that a revolution was certain in Panama. He went 
so far as to predict the definite date, November 3d; and 



THE PANAMA CANAL 225 

on November 3d the revolution came off as predicted. 
It was almost entirely bloodless, the total casualties being 
one Chinaman and one dog killed. 

The President on November 2d had ordered the 
Nashville, the Boston and the Dixie to keep the transit 
across the Isthmus free by preventing the landing of any 
armed forces at any point within fifty miles of Panama. 
A similar order had been given on other occasions when 
revolutions were imminent. Everybody in the Isthmus, 
including all the Colombian troops that were stationed 
there, joined the revolution. 

On the 6th, the United States recognized the new 
republic. A few days later M. Bunau-Varilla arrived in 
Washington as the accredited representative of the State 
of Panama, and on the 19th of November Hay had the 
satisfaction of writing to his daughter that after days and 
nights of strenuous work he had just signed a treaty with 
the new state, which gave the United States full power to 
proceed to construct the canal. 

The order prohibiting the landing of Colombian troops 
within fifty miles of Panama, though, as has been pointed 
out, not a novel order, followed as it was by the unpar- 
alleled quickness with which Roosevelt recognized the new 
republic, naturally created the impression among those 
who knew nothing of conditions on the Isthmus that the 
United States had instigated the revolution. The assump- 
tion, however, did not rest on any basis of fact. All we 
did was to use our police power under the Treaty of 
1846 to prevent general bloodshed on the Isthmus, and 
to refrain from using our forces, as we had done in 
previous revolutions, to uphold Colombian sovereignty. 

The President, by his immediate negotiation of a 
treaty with the new state, giving the United States the 

15 



226 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

right to acquire the necessary territory and construct the 
canal, not only insured the continued independence of the 
new State of Panama in accordance with the unanimous 
wish of its people, but also prevented the reopening of the 
whole canal question by the Congress which met on the 
first Monday of December, 1903. Had the President 
refused to see that a revolution was about to take place, 
and refrained from sending American warships to the 
Isthmus to protect American interests, had he allowed 
the Colombians and Panamanians to fight out their 
differences on the Isthmus, or had he hesitated until after 
the meeting of Congress in December to recognize the new 
government or negotiate a new treaty with their repre- 
sentative, M. Bunau-Varilla, then, at the time of Amer- 
ica's entry into the World War, there would have been no 
interoceanic canal. The end never justifies the means; 
but, on the other hand, a great and beneficent result is not 
proof that the action which made it possible was wrong. 
In the words of Secretary Hay: "It was the time to act, 
and not to theorize." I can see the point of view of those 
who say that we would have had no right to take the 
Isthmus by force, as Roosevelt was prepared to recom- 
mend. But we did not take it by force. I can see the 
reason for those who condemn Roosevelt's action, believ- 
ing that he fomented a revolution. But this criticism 
arises from a misapprehension of the real facts. He did 
not foment a revolution; indeed, he could not have pre- 
vented a revolution, unless, possibly, he had publicly 
announced the intention of the United States to use 
its armed forces to assist Colombia — an announcement 
which would not have had the slightest justification on 
any ground, moral or practical. Taking what he actually 
did under the facts as they actually were, "from begin- 




© Underwood & Underwood. N. Y. 

ROOSEVELT THE CANAL BUILDER 

mt £l Sg r Ste r Wit , h the g ? ft in C °lombian politics, President Roosevelt promotlv 

E&assE&ssg&F h Vn tal stasias 



THE PANAMA CANAL 227 

ning to the end, our course was straightforward and in 
absolute accord with the highest standards of international 
morality." 

On the ratification by the United States Senate of the 
treaty with the Republic of Panama, the last obstacle in 
the way of the construction of the canal was removed. 
The President promptly summoned a board of engineers 
to report on the type of canal to be built — sea-level or 
lock. A majority of the board, including all the foreign 
members, recommended the construction of a sea-level 
canal. The majority of the American engineers, however, 
favored a lock canal. Roosevelt was not a man to decide a 
question by majorities, or to delay construction further 
by continuing the discussion through the appointment 
of another commission. He carefully, but promptly, 
analyzed the reasons for and against each type of canal, 
and made up his own mind in favor of the existing lock 
type. He then placed the reasons for his conclusion so 
fully and fairly before the public that the American 
people practically unanimously accepted his decision as 
wise. From then on until the end of his Presidency 
literally night and day he ceased not to urge on the work. 

It was first necessary to make the Canal Zone habitable 
by exterminating the mosquito, the carrier of yellow 
fever. This work was performed most efficiently by" Dr. 
Gorgas. Congress had provided that the canal should be 
constructed under the supervision of a commission. At 
first Roosevelt tried to have the work done by the hydra- 
headed body which Congress had in mind. At first also 
he appointed engineers with experience in constructing 
large works for private corporations. When, however, 
he finally appointed Colonel Goethals as chief engineer, 
he knew within a short time that he had made the last 



228 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

change. A good executive knows when he finds the right 
man for a given place. Thereafter the President stood 
behind Colonel Goethals, backing him up in every possi- 
ble way. Congress still refusing to recede from its position 
that the canal should be built by a commission, Roose- 
velt overcame the difficulty by making Colonel Goethals 
chairman, and by an executive order so enlarged the 
powers of the chairman as to make the other members 
dependent upon him. 

And so the great work was done — not, indeed, com- 
pleted in Roosevelt's administration, but begun, and well 
started before his term of office came to an end. He had, 
by his energy, courage and correct judgment, made it 
possible for the United States to carry out the greatest 
undertaking of its kind that has ever been performed. 



CHAPTER XV 

The Campaign of 1904 

ROOSEVELT had, naturally, a strong desire to be 
nominated to succeed himself. He did not believe 
" in playing the hypocrite. He said frankly that he 
wanted to be nominated, and that he would be sorry if he 
were not. As a matter of fact, there was never a moment 
when his nomination by his party was in doubt. He had 
succeeded where Fillmore, Tyler, Johnson and Arthur had 
failed. He had carried out the policies of McKinley and 
had met, to the satisfaction of the great majority of the 
people, new and grave problems as they arose. Whatever 
many of the older politicians and statesmen of his party 
really thought of him, they were wise enough to realize 
that this apostle of the strenuous life, with his many-sided 
activities, who had "the training of a scholar and the 
breezy accessibility of the ranchman," was immensely 
popular with the public, and growing more popular every 
day. His nomination was more than an act of wisdom on 
the part of the Republican party; it was a necessity. 

A group of big politicans and Wall Street men did 
indeed meet to try and organize a movement to secure 
delegates to the convention pledged to another candidate, 
and as a result of this meeting, some effort was made in 
New Jersey, parts of the South and of the Central West 
as well as California; but the attempt came to nothing. 
Senator Mark Hanna was supposed by many to have 
Presidential aspirations, or at any rate to be much opposed 
to Roosevelt. But it is probable that the Senator had no 

(229) 



230 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

desire for the Presidency himself, really liked Roosevelt, 
and was entirely willing that he should be renominated. 
The Senator did wish to be the dominating figure in the 
Convention of 1904, as he had been in that of 1900, and 
therefore desired that the delegates should not be pledged 
in advance to any candidate. The question came to an 
issue in the Ohio State Convention. Senator Foraker 
desired to have the convention pass a resolution 
endorsing Roosevelt's administration and pledging the 
state to support him in the Republican National Conven- 
tion. Senator Hanna opposed the resolution, but when 
Roosevelt, then traveling in the West, telegraphed to the 
effect that he desired favorable action on the resolution, 
Senator Hanna withdrew his opposition. 

Thus, when the Republican Convention met in 
Chicago in 1904, the fact that they would nominate 
Roosevelt unanimously was a foregone conclusion. Elihu 
Root, as temporary chairman, made a notable speech 
in which he set forth the activities of the Roosevelt 
administration and challenged "judgment upon this 
record of effective performance." This speech was the 
keynote of the campaign that followed. The Republican 
party asked the people to endorse what Roosevelt in 
the three and a half years of his administration had 
accomplished. 

The record of things done was not unworthy. As 
the President himself said in his address to the Notifica- 
tion Committee, the administration had never pleaded 
impotence; it had never sought refuge in criticism 
and complaint instead of action. And, later, in his letter 
of acceptance, he could ask with pardonable pride: "To 
what phase of our foreign policy and to what use of the 
Navy do our opponents object? Do they object to the 




Photo from George Grantham Bain, N. Y. 

PRESIDENT ROOSEVELT AND VICE-PRESIDENT FAIRBANKS 

The election of Theodore Roosevelt and Charles W. Fairbanks in 1904, was 
marked by the greatest popular majority ever recorded, reaching a total of about 
2,000,000 votes. 




Photo from Wm. II . Ran, Phila. 

TAKING THE OATH OF OFFICE 

The inauguration of President Roosevelt on March 4, 1905. Chief Justice Fuller, 
of the Supreme Court of the United States, administering the oath. 






THE CAMPAIGN OF 1904 231 

way in which the Monroe Doctrine has been strengthened 
and upheld? Never before has this doctrine been 
acquiesced in abroad as it is now. . . . While upholding 
the rights of weaker American republics against foreign 
aggression, the administration has lost no opportunity to 
point out to these nations that those who seek equity 
should come with clean hands, and that whoever claims 
liberty as a right must accept the responsibilities that go 
with the exercise of it." 

Just as Roosevelt's nomination by his own party was 
a foregone conclusion, so was his election. The Demo- 
cratic party at the time was torn by opposing radical and 
conservative factions. The majority of the delegates 
came to the National Convention at St. Louis determined 
to repudiate Bryan, and to re-establish "a safe and sane 
Democracy." The sub-committee on Platform went so 
far as to recommend a plank declaring that the increase 
in the production of gold had made the gold standard 
satisfactory, thus expressly repudiating the main issue on 
which, eight years before, Bryan had made his first and 
greatest fight for the Presidency. But Bryan was a 
delegate to the convention, and his personal power was 
sufficient to defeat the proposed plank. So Judge Alton 
B. Parker, a Gold Democrat, was nominated on a plat- 
form which made no reference to the currency. The 
Democratic nominee was a conservative, upright gentle- 
man without a single attribute of aggressive leadership, 
besides which he had been out of politics for nearly 
twenty years. 

The campaign was a humdrum affair until towards the 
close. Roosevelt had made George B. Cortelyou his 
campaign manager. Mr Cortelyou resigned as Secretary 
of Commerce and Labor to accept the position. Judge 



232 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Parker, in a public speech in New York City, charged that 
the President and Mr. Cortelyou had entered into a 
conspiracy to blackmail corporations into making large 
contributions to the Republican campaign fund, Mr. 
Cortelyou using his knowledge of corporate wrong-doing 
obtained while he was Secretary of the Department of 
Commerce and Labor. The President and Mr. Cortelyou 
for some days remained silent, but, on November 5th, 
Roosevelt published a statement in which he declared 
that he had chosen Mr. Cortelyou to manage his campaign 
because he believed him possessed of the highest integrity; 
that Mr. Cortelyou had continually told him during the 
campaign that if elected, he would go into the Presidency 
unhampered by any pledge, promise or understanding of 
any kind, sort or description, and that the statements 
made by Judge Parker were "unqualifiedly and atro- 
ciously false." If the controversy had any effect on the 
election at all, the effect was beneficial to the President. 
Fortunately, it is rarely wise, even from the low standard 
of getting votes, to charge your opponent with a crime, 
unless you have full and conclusive proof of your 
accusation. 

In the fall of 1906 there was a slight recrudescence of 
Judge Parker's charges which called for another and much 
longer statement from the President. In his statement 
in reply to Judge Parker, he had not denied that corpo- 
rations had contributed to the Republican Campaign 
Fund, just as they had contributed to the Democratic 
Campaign Fund. Through the publication of a letter 
written by E. H. Harriman, the railroad magnate, in the 
New York World — though it is only fair to say that the 
publication was probably without Mr. Harriman's con- 
sent — it became generally known that Harriman charged 



THE CAMPAIGN OF 1904 238 

the President with having sent for him shortly before the 
election of 1904. Roosevelt, he said, had asked him to 
raise a large campaign fund for use in the Presidential 
campaign in New York, and had formally promised him 
to appoint Chauncey M. Depew Ambassador to France. 
Mr. Harriman further stated that he had raised about 
two hundred thousand dollars and that Roosevelt had 
refused to fulfil his promise to appoint Depew. 

Roosevelt replied to the charges in a letter to Mr. 
Sherman, afterwards Vice-President, Mr. Harriman, 
having reiterated the charges to Sherman. With charac- 
teristic fulness of detail — setting forth all the corres- 
pondence between Harriman and himself — Roosevelt 
showed that the financier had been much interested 
in the success of the New York Republican State ticket, 
headed by Mr. Higgins, the candidate for Governor; 
that he, Roosevelt, was anxious to see Harriman to 
ascertain whether there was anything he could do to 
help Mr. Higgins, and that so far from promising to 
appoint Mr. Depew as Ambassador to France, he had 
expressly pointed out to Mr. Harriman that Governor 
Odell, who had been urging Mr. Depew's appointment, 
was now urging the appointment of Mr. Hyde, but that 
he, Roosevelt, did not believe that he could appoint 
either gentleman. 

The election was held on November 8th. Roosevelt's 
majority was about two million and a half out of a total 
of thirteen and a half million votes cast, the largest 
popular majority ever given for any Presidential candi- 
date. In the Electoral College he received three hundred 
and thirty-six votes as against one hundred and forty for 
Judge Parker. Secretary Hay going over to the White 
House at nine o'clock in the evening on the day of the 



234 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

election, found that the Democratic candidate had 
already sent his congratulations. Indeed, the victory- 
was so overwhelming that the result was known shortly 
after seven o'clock. "I am glad," Roosevelt said, "to be 
President in my own right." A fact that gave him even 
more satisfaction and pride was that he had been able 
to make the fight for election on his own clearly-avowed 
principles, and on his own record. 

Throughout the campaign, the Democrats had charged 
that if elected, Roosevelt would regard his first elected 
term as his first term, and again seek re-election in the fall 
of 1908, thus trying to remain President for eleven and a 
half consecutive years. Until assured of his election, the 
President steadily refused to make any statement on 
the subject. The moment however, his re-election was 
assured he issued the following statement: 

"The wise custom which limits the President to two 
terms regards the substance and not the form, and under 
no circumstances will I be a candidate for, or accept 
another nomination." 

He fulfilled this promise to the American people. As 
his second term drew to a close, no amount of pressure 
would induce him for a moment to consider the possibility 
of his acceptance of a renomination. A careful reading of 
the exact form of words used in his announcement shows 
that on its face it may be interpreted either as a declara- 
tion that he would not accept a renomination at the end 
of the term for which he had just been elected, or as a 
declaration that never again throughout his life would he 
seek the Presidential office. When a public man makes a 
statement which on careful reading is open to one of two 
interpretations, his own explanation of the meaning which 
he intended is accepted by all persons except those so 



THE CAMPAIGN OF 1904 235 

twisted mentally that their normal instinct is to believe 
every public man a liar, or who have, as respects the 
particular public man making the statement, a strong 
antipathy and prejudice. 

Roosevelt's own explanation of his meaning and the 
reasons for the exact phraseology used is simple and 
direct. He tells us that he did not expressly say 
that he would not be a candidate in 1908 because if he 
had, his statement would have been instantly taken as a 
declaration that he was, or thought it likely that he might 
be, a candidate at some future time, when, as a matter of 
fact, he was not thinking, as he said to an inquirer at the 
time, about 1912, '16 or '20. What he was thinking about 
was the fact that the Presidency is a veiy great office; 
that the holder has power, if he chooses to use it, to do 
much to effect his own renomination and election, and 
that the custom which limits the holder to two terms is 
wise. But of course this reason does not apply to the man 
who, having held two terms, retires to private life. The 
very moment he is out of office the power which was his 
because he held the office is lost. 

The weather in the early morning of the 4th of March, 
1905, was threatening, but by the time Roosevelt went 
out to the east front of the capitol to deliver his inaugural 
address, the sun shone brightly. The address was short, 
but in what he said, the reader may find the touchstone 
by which to interpret the foreign and domestic policies 
of his administration, especially the domestic policies of 
his second term. After pointing out that to us as a Nation 
much has been given, and that, therefore, much will 
rightfully be required, he said: 

"We have duties to others and duties to ourselves; 
and we can shirk neither. We have become a great 



236 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Nation, forced by the fact of its greatness into relations 
with the other nations of the earth, and we must behave 
as beseems a people with such responsibilities. . . . While 
ever careful to refrain from wronging others, we must 
be no less insistent that we are not wronged ourselves. 
We wish peace; but we wish the peace of justice, the 
peace of righteousness. We wish it because we think it 
is right, and not because we are afraid. No weak nation 
that acts manfully and justly should ever have cause to 
fear us, and no strong power should ever be able to single 
us out as a subject for insolent aggression." 

Turning to our relations among ourselves, he pointed 
out that our growth in wealth, in population and in power 
is inevitably accompanied by new problems, saying: 

"Our fathers faced certain perils which we have out- 
grown. We now face other perils the very existence of 
which it was impossible that they should foresee. Modern 
life is both complex and intense, and the tremendous 
changes wrought by the extraordinary industrial develop- 
ment of the last half century are felt in every fiber of our 
social and political being. . . . The conditions which 
have told for our marvelous material well-being, which 
have developed to a very high degree our energy, self- 
reliance, and individual initiative, have also brought the 
care and anxiety inseparable from the accumulation of 
great wealth in industrial centers. . . . There is no good 
reason why we should fear the future, but there is every 
reason why we should face it seriously, neither hiding 
from ourselves the gravity of the problems before us 
nor fearing to approach these problems with the un- 
bending, unflinching purpose to solve them aright." 

When he took the oath of office he wore a ring given 
him by John Hay containing a lock of Lincoln's hair. Of 



THE CAMPAIGN OF 1904 237 

all the gifts that he ever received, this was the one he 
prized most. In the letter accompanying the ring, Hay 
said, referring to the coming inauguration, "Please wear 
it tomorrow; you are one of the men who most thoroughly 
understands and appreciates Lincoln." This, coming 
from the man who had been Lincoln's Secretary, meant 
much to Roosevelt, for of all our public men, he most 
admired the martyred President. In the fullest sense of 
the words he did understand and appreciate Lincoln. 
The two men, so different in external manner and daily 
habit, were, after all, singularly alike in moral character 
and in their method of approaching and solving public 
questions. 

He received, on his inauguration, another gift which 
especially appealed to him. In a letter written on June 7, 
1916, to Mr. Herbert Warren, of Magdalen College 
Oxford, he says: 

"In my Autobiography I did not like to speak of the 
various presents given me by European sovereigns. Next 
to Hay's gift of the ring with the hair of President Lin- 
coln, the gift I appreciated most which I received while 
in the White House was from King Edward. It was a 
very beautiful miniature of John Hampden sent me at the 
time of my inauguration, at the same time that I received 
the ring from John Hay. It seemed to me to mark King 
Edward's tact and genuine refinement of feeling that he 
should have chosen that precise gift for an American 
President." 



CHAPTER XVI 

President in His Own Right 

ON February 10, 1904, war broke out between Russia 
and Japan. Each had for a long time looked with 
growing jealousy upon the other's position in the 
Far East. Japan resented Russia's presence in Manchuria 
and finally presented an ultimatum to Russia requiring 
her to respect Japanese rights in that province. Upon 
Russia's failure to agree to the terms of this ultimatum, 
actual hostilities began. For a year and a half the war 
was waged with great violence. By the summer of 
1905 the Russians had suffered enormous losses of men 
and the destruction of almost their entire fleet. The 
Japanese, although they had been more successful in 
battle had, nevertheless, been heavily punished. The 
truth was that both sides were near bankruptcy and 
exhaustion. 

At this crisis the President decided to interfere. It 
seemed to him that a continuation of the war would 
probably have resulted in Russia's defeat, but there was 
no certainty of this. The one certain thing was that both 
nations would soon expend more blood and treasure than 
any victory could justify. He accordingly suggested 
informally to both Japan and Russia that he would be 
glad to bring together representatives to a peace confer- 
ence. Having satisfied himself that both were willing to 
respond to a formal proposal, he sent them, on June 8, 
1905, an identical note. In this note he urged them "not 
only for their own sakes but in the interest of the whole 

(238) 



EWSTHBV 

C 3 Q _, x- P ^j 
t 1 5c - 5" n IS ffi 



in ft ?T O 

3 3 - 




PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 239 

civilized world to open direct negotiations for peace with 
each other." Both accepted the invitation and the 
question of the meeting place immediately arose. Russia 
suggested Paris, while Japan preferred Chefu; each 
objected to the other's choice because each feared an 
unfriendly atmosphere. At last Washington was agreed 
upon, with the understanding that the President would 
furnish accommodations in New England if Washington 
should prove too warm. 

Throughout the whole of the proceedings which 
ensued, the President played a leading part. In an 
endeavor to smooth away as far as possible the difficulties 
of the coming discussion, he conferred at Sagamore Hill 
with Baron Kaneko, who represented the Mikado, and 
with Baron Rosen, one of the Russian envoys. When 
the Japanese envoys arrived they were entertained at 
Oyster Bay, where they were followed a few days later 
by the Russians. The President's common sense and his 
anxious desire to achieve an understanding, prevented 
questions of precedence from causing any friction. So far 
as possible, the representatives of both countries were 
entertained and treated alike. 

At last the formal meeting between the plenipotenti- 
aries took place on the Mayflower in Oyster Bay on 
August 5th. The President entertained his guests in the 
vessel's cabin, and with singular happiness of speech 
proposed this toast: "Gentlemen, I propose a toast to 
which there will be no answer and which I ask you to 
drink in silence, standing. I drink to the welfare and 
prosperity of the sovereigns and the peoples of the two 
great nations, whose representatives have met one 
another on this ship. It is my earnest hope and prayer, in 
the interest not only of these two great powers, but of all 



240 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

civilized mankind, that a just and lasting peace may 
speedily be concluded between them." 

After the formal meeting, the two parties were carried 
by separate naval vessels to Portsmouth, N. H. There, on 
August 9th, the first session of the Peace Conference was 
held in the Government building in the navy yard. The 
Japanese presented twelve terms for acceptance by 
Russia. To eight of these Count Sergius Witte and 
Baron Rosen, the Russian envoys, speedily agreed; but to 
the proposals that Russia should surrender territorial claims 
and should pay a money indemnity, they refused to assent. 
Matters thus came to an impasse and the plenipotentiaries 
having agreed to disagree between themselves, cabled to 
their respective governments for further instructions. 

It was at this juncture that President Roosevelt again 
took a hand in the situation. He asked Baron Kaneko to 
visit him at Oyster Bay, and through him communicated 
his views to the Japanese delegates — Baron Koinura and 
Mr. Takahira. He advised them to waive their claim for 
an indemnity, pointing out that Russia was perfectly firm 
in her refusal to humble herself to this extent, and that 
her ability to pay would grow less as the war proceeded. 
He further pointed out that persistence in the demand for 
an indemnity would be likely to alienate the sympathy 
of most of the civilized world. 

He also called Baron Rosen to Oyster Bay, and sent to 
George Von L. Meyer, the American Ambassador at St. 
Petersburg, instructions to secure a personal interview 
with the Czar. He urged Russia to surrender the southern 
half of the Island of Saghelien, which the Japanese had 
taken during the war. 

When the envoys again met, the Japanese presented 
for the last time their former demands, which were again 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 241 

met with a refusal. Then they offered to waive an indem- 
nity provided Russia would surrender her claim to half of 
Saghelien. To this the Russians immediately agreed and 
on September 5th the representatives of both countries 
signed the treaty of peace. 

In recognition of the President's great service in this 
matter, he received the Nobel Peace Prize consisting of a 
medal and $40,000 in money. He kept the medal, but the 
money he used as the foundation of a fund to be used for 
the promotion of industrial peace. He also received from 
a group of distinguished Frenchmen an original copy of 
Sully's "Memoires of Henry le Grand," "in sympathetic 
recognition of the persistent and decisive initiative he 
had taken towards gradually substituting friendly and 
judicial for violent methods in cases of conflict between 
nations." 

Another international question was involved in an 
effort to exclude the Japanese from the San Francisco 
schools. In October, 1906, a resolution of the San Fran- 
cisco Board of Education made effective a state statute 
which had been passed about five years before. By virtue 
of this resolution Chinese, Korean and Japanese children 
were excluded from the ordinary public schools and were 
sent to schools specially provided for them. The Chinese 
and Koreans acquiesced in the order, but the Japanese 
withdrew their children from school entirely, while their 
ambassador lodged a protest with the State Department. 
By the treaty of 1894 between the United States and 
Japan, each country had guaranteed to the citizens of the 
other the greatest possible freedom of life and intercourse 
apart from actual citizenship, including the rights of 
residence and travel. The Japanese now contended that 
this treaty was violated by the California school order. 

16 



242 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Roosevelt took the perfectly proper position that a treaty 
entered into by the United States was paramount to a 
state law, and immediately directed the United States 
District Attorney at San Francisco to institute proceed- 
ings to test the validity of the objectionable order. 

In all this matter the real difficulty arose out of the 
Californians' fear of the competition of cheap Japanese 
labor. They resented the settlement in their state of 
great numbers of Orientals whose standards of life enabled 
them to work for wages which would not support the 
average American. The school matter was only an 
incident arising out of the race feeling which had been 
engendered. The President sympathized with the Cali- 
fornians in their general position. "The people of Cali- 
fornia," he said, "were right in insisting that the Japanese 
should not come thither in mass ; that there should be no 
influx of laborers, of agricultural workers, or small 
tradesmen — in short, no mass settlement or immigration. 
The Japanese themselves would not tolerate the intrusion 
into their country of a mass of Americans who would 
displace Japanese in the business of the land." 

At his request, the Mayor of San Francisco and other 
leading citizens came on to see him and he explained to 
them his desire to help them, but his firm intention of 
asserting the supremacy of the Federal Government in 
dealing with foreign nations. He told them that he 
disapproved of any mixture of nations on a large scale, 
but that he also disapproved strongly of the exclusion of 
Japanese children from the schools. 

The question was at last happily settled by agreement. 
The Japanese Government undertook to prevent the 
immigration of laborers to this country and the Cali- 
fornians agreed to withdraw the school order. Congress 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 243 

passed an act on February 20, 1907, at the President's 
request, which empowered him to exclude from this 
country Japanese laborers coming from Mexico, Canada 
and Hawaii. By executive order of March 14th, he made 
this act effective. Two years later, in a letter to the 
Speaker of the Calif ornian Assembly, he was able to 
point to the success of this policy. The total number of 
Japanese in the United States had by this time diminished 
by over two thousand, and the causes of friction were 
gradually disappearing. 

The problems arising from the Spanish War were not 
completely solved during Roosevelt's administration, 
nor, indeed, have they been completely solved to this day. 
When Cuba had started upon her independent course 
her constitution gave to the United States the right to 
intervene, when absolutely necessary, for the preservation 
of a lawful government. All went well until President 
Palma's first term expired. Upon his re-election in 1905 a 
revolution was begun by his political opponents and he 
rapidly lost the power to preserve order. In September, 
1906, at his request, sailors were landed from the United 
States cruiser Denver, to protect American property at 
Havana. But the sailors were promptly withdrawn by 
orders from Washington. The next day the President 
conferred with his advisers at Oyster Bay and determined 
to send Mr. Taft, the Secretary of War, and Robert 
Bacon, the Assistant Secretary of State, to attempt to 
reconcile the two factions. But reconciliation appeared to 
be impossible. President Palma resigned and a quorum 
of the Congress could not be got to elect a successor. 
The island was thrown into chaos. 

Accordingly, Secretary Taft formally proclaimed 
American intervention, and the President appointed 



244 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Charles E. Magoon as provisional governor of the island. 
United States troops were sent to maintain order and 
normal conditions were rapidly restored. Some fear was 
expressed that this action would result in the annexation 
of Cuba, but, true to our original promise, intervention 
ceased with the necessity for it, and January, 1909, saw 
Cuba turned over again to its inhabitants under the 
Presidency of General Gomez — Palma's former opponent. 

President Roosevelt felt strongly his responsibility for 
securing proper legislation, and the record of his achieve- 
ments in this respect is long. 

When he succeeded to the Presidency in 1901, the 
railroads exercised a vast and almost unchecked power 
over the industry of the country. The Interstate Com- 
merce Commission had been created in 1887, but succes- 
sive decisions of the Supreme Court had gradually shorn 
the Commission of any real power. The practice of giving 
rebates to favored shippers was common. By this means 
powerful business interests were able to transport their 
goods at a rate lower than that accorded to their weaker 
competitors, with the result that many a small enterprise 
was pushed to the wall. In his first message to Congress, 
on December 3, 1901, Roosevelt called attention to this 
situation. He also pointed out that there was in fact no 
longer any power in the Interstate Commerce Commission 
to fix rates, although it had been intended to confer that 
power upon them by the act of 1887. "The act should 
be amended," he said. "The railway is a public servant. 
Its rates should be just to and open to all shippers alike. 
The government should see to it that within its juris- 
diction this is so and should provide a speedy, inexpensive, 
and effective remedy to that end." 

Not long after the writing of this message, Paul 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 245 

Morton, the president of the Atchison, Topeka and Santa 
Fe Railroad Company, offered to lend his aid in exposing 
and ending the rebate evil. Thanks to his help and to the 
President's tireless insistence, Congress passed the Elkins 
Act, which became a law on February 19, 1903. This act 
was a considerable advance over the previous law. It 
forbade railroads to vary from their published rates, and 
provided that violation of its provisions either by a 
railroad corporation itself or by its officers or agents 
should be a punishable offense. 

But the most important railway legislation was yet to 
come. The vital necessity of fixing and maintaining 
reasonable rates was apparent, and the President repeat- 
edly urged upon Congress the passage of a statute giving 
the Interstate Commerce Commission this power. He did 
not believe that this would afford a panacea for the evils 
under which the country had been suffering, but he 
regarded it as the best practicable step which could be 
taken. "A measure of good will come," he said, "some 
good will be done, some injustice will have been prevented; 
but we shall be a long way from the millennium." And he 
further added this caution: "When you give the Nation 
that power, remember that harm and not good will come 
unless you give it with the firm determination not only 
to get justice for yourselves, but to do justice to others. 
You must be as jealous to do justice to the railroads as to 
exact justice from them." 

On May 4, 1906, he sent Congress a special message 
accompanied by a report which had been submitted to 
him by the Commissioner of the Bureau of Corporations. 
By this report it appeared that the Standard Oil Company 
had been benefiting by secret rates to the extent of 
three-quarters of a million dollars yearly and had further 



246 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

profited by other rates which, although not secret, were 
adjusted to its advantage. 

As a result of this message and of the popular feeling 
which the President's attitude had finally aroused, 
Congress took the matter up in earnest. In the face of 
tremendous opposition the Hepburn Rate Bill was driven 
through the House. In the Senate it was referred to a 
committee whose chairman opposed it. The ranking 
minority member of this committee was Senator Tillman 
of South Carolina who favored the bill. The President 
had cancelled an invitation to Tillman to dine at the 
White House because the Senator had assaulted, in the 
Senate Chamber, his colleague from South Carolina. As 
a result, the personal relations between Roosevelt and 
Tillman were strained, to say the least. The majority 
of the committee determined to file an unfavorable 
report, and turned the bill over to Senator Tillman, 
thereby making him its sponsor and hoping to make it 
impossible for the President to urge its passage. But their 
plan failed of its effect because, as Roosevelt said, he was 
delighted to go with Tillman or with any one else "just 
so long as he was traveling my way — and no longer." 

The act in its final form was to some extent a compro- 
mise. The conservatives wished to emasculate it by 
extending too far the right of appeal to the courts. The 
radicals, on the other hand, were willing to risk a conflict 
with the constitution by an effort to abolish the appeal 
entirely. Senator La Follette, of Wisconsin, insisted that 
the Interstate Commerce Commission should be charged 
with the duty of valuing the railroad properties so as to be 
able to fix a basis for reasonable rates. He argued with 
great force that otherwise it would be possible only to 
determine whether a given rate was reasonable in relation 



8 8^2 

" S CO th " 

g o r+ to 

3 o P w. 

So 




PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 247 

to other rates, and not whether the whole body of rates 
was reasonable. The country was not prepared for this 
suggestion, although it found its way into the statute law 
seven years later. The Hepburn Bill was finally passed 
in the form advocated by the President and became a law 
on June 29, 1906. 

The effect of this statute was far-reaching. Under 
the old law the Interstate Commerce Commission simply 
had power to investigate any rate on complaint and to 
suggest a substitute. In practice the final determination 
of the matter was by the slow process of the Federal 
courts. The new bill gave to the Interstate Commerce 
Commission in terms the right to fix rates. 

Another statute which particularly affected the rail- 
roads was the Employers' Liability Act originally passed 
in June, 1906. This act made common carriers who were 
engaged in interstate commerce liable for injuries to 
their employees, even though the injury was due to the 
negligence of another employee or of the injured man 
himself. On January 6, 1907, the Supreme Court declared 
the act unconstitutional, because it attempted to regulate 
the rights of all railroad employees whether or not they 
were engaged in interstate commerce. On January 31, 
1908, the President sent a special message to Congress 
urging the enactment of a law which would not be open 
to this constitutional objection. Such an act was finally 
passed and received his approval on April 22, 1908. 

One further important piece of legislation should be 
mentioned. In accordance with the President's recom- 
mendation, Congress, on June 30, 1906, passed the Food 
and Drugs Act which forbade the use of injurious drugs 
in food and drink transported between the states, and 
forbade the use of false and misleading labels on packages 



248 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

containing such food and drink. At the same time 
government inspection of meat was provided for. Both 
of these acts were important and indeed necessary for the 
preservation of the public health. 

The Brownsville affair of 1906 was treated by many of 
the President's enemies as a race question. But it was 
simply a matter of military discipline, and the question 
of race did not enter into the President's action at all. 
Between the colored soldiers of the 25th Infantry at Fort 
Brown and the white citizens of the adjacent town of 
Brownsville, Texas, considerable race feeling had devel- 
oped. On the night of August 13th a number of soldiers, 
variously estimated at from nine to twenty, jumped over 
the walls of the barracks and ran into the town carrying 
their loaded rifles. When they reached the streets they 
began shooting at any one they saw and into any house 
where there were lights. Several people miraculously 
escaped death from shots fired into the very rooms in 
which they sat. The Lieutenant of Police was wounded 
and his horse killed under him. In one of the saloons a 
bartender was killed and another man wounded. 

The call to arms was sounded at the barracks and the 
guilty soldiers took their places in the ranks under cover 
of the darkness. An investigation was immediately 
instituted, but the enlisted men and non-commissioned 
officers of the three companies all united in refusing to 
give any information which would lead to the apprehen- 
sion of the murderers, although it was plain that their 
identity must be known to most of the battalion. 

A report of the matter having been submitted to the 
President he summarily discharged nearly all the members 
of the three companies involved. Immediately the press 
rang with the incident. The President was accused of 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 249 

having acted toward colored soldiers as he would not have 
acted had they been white; and an attempt was made to 
alienate the negroes from their loyalty to him. He 
indignantly denied this charge, and in response to a Senate 
resolution transmitted to that body, on December 19th, a 
report of the affair. In this report he cited, in justification 
of his action, numerous precedents drawn from the history 
of the Civil War. He called attention to the fact that in 
making Federal appointments he had made character 
and not color the test of fitness, and asserted emphatically 
that white soldiers would have received from him the 
same treatment as black. No one who reviews the story 
of his relation to the colored problem can for a moment 
suppose that in this Brownsville affair he was actuated 
by any motive other than a desire to promote the welfare 
of the United States army, and to wipe out so far as 
possible a stain upon its uniform. 

Roosevelt was not merely a good executive; he was one 
of the ablest executives we have ever had in public life; 
certainly, in this respect, no other President can compare 
with him except Washington. 

Some men have the ability to grasp large questions 
of public policy, but wholly lack the ability to transact 
executive business quickly and efficiently; others, while 
they may have the power to select with wisdom subor- 
dinates, are so constituted that they can not attend to 
routine work. Roosevelt, like Washington, knew the 
value of attention to details in all matters pertaining to 
what we may call his personal actions. Though he wrote 
thousands of letters, his system of filing was such that 
any letter on any subject could be produced literally 
at a moment's notice. Under him, the White House was, 
as we have seen, a model business office, while social 



250 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

functions, public and private, moved forward with a 
smoothness which added greatly to the comfort and 
enjoyment of the guests. 

It was, however, as the executive head of the vast 
machinery of the Federal Government that Roosevelt 
showed his great qualities as an executive. He could grasp 
quickly all the essential facts of any situation, however 
complex, and reach a decision, not hastily, but quickly. 
The decision once reached, he acted instantly. I have seen 
great lawyers able to take a mass of legal papers pertaining 
to a given subject or dispute and merely by rapidly turn- 
ing the typewritten pages, extract from a mass of detail 
all the information necessary to enable them to form a 
judgment. What able lawyers or other trained special- 
ists can do in their chosen fields, where years of labor 
have made them proficient, Roosevelt could do in prac- 
tically every field of government activity. His interests 
were so broad, his observations so keen and his memory so 
retentive that there were few departments of the govern- 
ment in which his subordinates did not find that the 
President knew almost as much and sometimes more 
than they did themselves. 

In spite of this marvelous power of assimilation, he 
could never have produced the results he did had he not 
been so deeply interested in practically every branch of 
government business. Secretary Hay said that whereas 
he saw McKinley on official business about once a month, 
he saw Roosevelt every day. This measures the relative 
intensity of the interest of the two men in international 
questions. The experience of the Secretary of State was 
duplicated by almost every member of McKinley 's 
Cabinet, when Roosevelt became President. Neither did 
Roosevelt confine his dealings with the business of the 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 251 

departments to their chiefs. He knew personally all the 
heads of the many bureaus and many of their assistants. 
When any work was going forward on which he wanted 
quick action — and he usually wanted most things done 
quickly — the man directly responsible knew that the 
President might send for him at any time, that he would 
give him generous praise if he did well, but that for 
slackness no excuse would be accepted. 

In this connection, the following letter from Gifford 
Pinchot, on account of his long and intimate association 
with Roosevelt, is of especial interest and value: 

"President Roosevelt's remarkable power as an 
executive, rested, as I knew him, principally upon the 
following qualities: 

"First, and most of all, his natural tendency was to 
act. He understood that while action may sometimes be 
wrong, the failure to act is almost always so. He was 
painstakingly careful in reaching conclusions on matters 
of great moment, but once the conclusion was reached 
action followed instantly. This was so true that it was 
never safe to go to him with any plan that was not fully 
worked out and ready for action. 

"Roosevelt trusted his men and gave them their 
head. He knew, as every great executive must, that he 
could not do it all himself. He wanted us, each within our 
sphere, to act as vigorously as he did himself. Once he 
had come to have confidence in the wisdom and honesty 
of an adviser, he adopted recommendations almost as a 
matter of course. The result was that the men working 
under him were not only confident in his support, but had 
a feeling of pride and proprietorship in their work which 
doubled their efficiency. 

"Red tape had no place in his scheme of life. He 



252 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

wanted things done — done in accordance with rules if 
possible — but in any event done. I remember his sending 
for an official, who had reported that a certain thing 
could not be done, to say if the official in question could 
not see his way to do it, he, the President, would get 
somebody in his place who could. Where red tape 
conflicted with getting things done, it was always the 
red tape that had to suffer. With him machinery never 
took the place of the end for which the machinery had 
been created. Roosevelt had an unequaled capacity for 
inspiring the men who worked under him. During his 
administration thousands of clerks in Washington who 
had never spoken with him or shaken his hand were 
filled with the spirit of his great personality, saw the 
vision of the larger things to be accomplished through 
the medium of their minor tasks, and gave the best that 
was in them instead of watching the clock. 

"Promotion was for merit in Roosevelt's time. As 
former Civil Service Commissioner he understood that it 
is no more important to keep the faithful civil servant 
in office than to get rid of the unfit. The sin of the 
delinquent was sure to find him out, and no amount of 
political influence could keep the unfit in office, prevent 
the recognition of the efficient or defer the punishment 
of the guilty. Under him the chiefs in the departments 
were free from political control. During my twelve years 
of office there was never to my knowledge a single case of 
appointing, promoting, dismissing, or retaining any one 
in the United States Forest Service for political reasons. 

"Roosevelt not only appointed men for merit and 
gave them a chance to do their work, but when their 
work clashed with private interests he stood firmly 
behind them against political and financial pressure of 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 253 

every kind. Without his backing they would have been 
helpless, or would have been forced out. 

"Roosevelt led his men. He asked nothing of us that 
he was not ready to do himself. He was his own severest 
taskmaster, and he expected of himself and actually 
accomplished more work than any of us. 

"Finally, he was always more than generous in 
acknowledging help or good work, not seldom to the 
point of attributing to others the credit for things done 
or said for which he was mainly responsible." 

"I did not usurp power," said Roosevelt, "but I did 
greatly broaden the use of executive power." This 
statement accurately describes the net result of his 
executive actions as President. He believed that it was 
his duty to act for the welfare of all the people as he saw 
that welfare, unless he was expressly prohibited by the 
Constitution or limited to one course of action only by 
Congress, though in the latter case he insisted that the 
act of Congress must not encroach on the constitutional 
prerogatives of the executive. 

Roosevelt's action in withdrawing public lands from 
entry as well as his action in appointing a number of 
voluntary unpaid commissions to report to him on such 
matters as government scientific work, department 
methods, and country life, to which I shall refer in the 
chapter on his work for the preservation of the natural 
resources of the Nation, are examples of the practical 
application of this theory of executive power. In each 
instance there was no express warrant in any act of 
Congress for the action taken by the President, and yet, 
in each instance, great benefit resulted to the people of 
the United States. 

He believed, and rightly, that in his attitude towards 



254 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

his power and duty as the chief executive of the Nation, 
he was treading in the footsteps of Lincoln, while those 
who criticised his actions as improper or unconstitutional 
were taking what he called the legalistic or Buchanan 
attitude towards executive power. He often said that as 
he wore a ring containing the hair of Lincoln on the 
occasion of his inauguration, he bound himself to treat 
the constitution after the manner of Lincoln. 

Many people believe that a President in making his 
appointments should select the best man without con- 
sulting the party leaders in the state where the appointee 
is to reside and to exercise the functions of his office. 
These people not only forget that the President is respon- 
sible to the party to whose votes he owes his office, but 
they also forget that the Constitution of the United 
States requires important Presidential appointments to 
be ratified by the Senate. For many years it has been the 
unwritten law of the Senate that no appointment shall 
be ratified unless approved by the Senators of the state 
involved. Even George Washington, should he unex- 
pectedly re-appear among us, could not expect to receive 
an appointment to a Federal office unless he had the 
backing of the Senators from Virginia. It follows that a 
President often selects not the man whom he considers 
the very best for the position, but the very best man 
whom, under our system, he is permitted to appoint. 

Appointments to the diplomatic service are not of a 
local nature and therefore Roosevelt selected an ambassa- 
dor or minister solely on the basis of his own knowledge of 
the appointee's fitness. In filling minor offices, however, 
he usually accepted the suggestion of the Republican 
Senator or Senators from the state in which the appoint- 
ment was to be made. If there was no Republican 






PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 255 

Senator from that state then he usually acted on the 
advice of the local Republican leaders. If a Senator 
or other political leader ever knowingly suggested an 
unfit man for a position, he never had an opportunity to 
deceive the President again. 

For important offices, such as those of judge or 
district attorney, while he sometimes took the advice of 
the local party leaders, he was always careful, so far as 
possible, to acquaint himself personally with a candidate's 
qualifications before appointing him. In the great 
majority of such cases he acted on his own. judgment and 
appointed the man whom he believed best qualified for 
the position. 

There were, of course, many cases in which his appoint- 
ments were the subject of adverse criticism. Take for 
instance the case of William Plimley. The Assistant 
Treasurership at New York City became vacant and the 
President cast about for a high-class man to fill the place. 
He confidentially invited George R. Sheldon and Robert 
Bacon to accept the appointment, but both of them 
declined. Either would have been above criticism. No 
suggestions were forthcoming from the commercial 
interests of New York City. The situation was growing 
serious because the sub treasury had no head. At last 
Senator Piatt came forward with the suggestion of Mr. 
Plimley, who was backed not only by the Senator but 
by a former member of McKinley's Cabinet and by other 
eminent men. Plimley accordingly received the appoint- 
ment. While it was true that he was Piatt's choice, yet 
it was also true that the President had done his best to 
pick his own man for the position, and had investigated 
Plimley's character so far as possible before appointing 
him. 



256 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Another instance illustrates the President's attitude 
towards the subject of appointments. Penrose A. McClain 
was Internal Revenue Collector at Philadelphia. He had 
been a member of Senator Quay's organization but had 
quarreled with his associates. Shortly afterwards there 
came a local campaign in which the Quay men were 
opposed by the independents. In accordance with the 
President's orders, McClain was advised to keep out of 
the fight, but he could not resist the temptation to have 
a fling at Senator Quay. The regulars won the election, 
and when McClain's term expired Senators Quay and 
Penrose asked that he should be retired. The President 
was not willing to have the peace of his administration 
disturbed by factional disputes between United States 
Senators and Federal officeholders, and he accordingly 
agreed that McClain should go. 

William McCoach was suggested for McClain's place. 
The President did not know him. Accordingly he allowed 
the possibility of his appointment to be announced 
and then waited to watch the effect. There appeared 
nothing against him and Roosevelt accordingly asked 
his two sponsors to furnish certificates of character. 
This they readily did and McCoach's commission was 
sent to him at once. This was another case in which the 
impossibility of personal acquaintance with every candi- 
date for office made it necessary to rely upon the recom- 
mendation of the responsible party leaders. 

Once his administration was fairly on its way, Roose- 
velt's Cabinet appointments were largely by way of pro- 
motion. He filled vacancies with men who had success- 
fully performed their responsible duties, instead of with 
untried men whose abilities he had had no personal 
opportunity to observe. Thus George B. Cortelyou, 



PRESIDENT IN HIS OWN RIGHT 257 

who began as Private Secretary to the President, 
became Secretary of the Department of Commerce and 
Labor, then Postmaster -General and then Secretary 
of the Treasury. Elihu Root, who had retired from 
the War Department to private life, was called back 
to become Secretary of State upon John Hay's death in 
1905, and held that position until he resigned on January 
25, 1909, to become United States Senator from New 
York, He was then succeeded by Robert Bacon, the 
Assistant Secretary. 

Charles J. Bonaparte, who had been a special assistant 
to the Attorney-General in the investigation of the 
postal frauds, became Secretary of the Navy in 1905 and 
later became Attorney-General. Secretary Metcalf moved 
up from the Department of Commerce and Labor to the 
Navy Department and remained there until ill health 
compelled him to retire, when he was succeeded by the 
Assistant Secretary, Truman H. Newberry. James R. 
Garfield, a son of the murdered President, made a splendid 
record as Commissioner of Corporations, and finally 
became Secretary of the Interior. Attorney-General 
Moody, after arduous and faithful service, received an 
appointment to the Supreme Court. George Von L. 
Meyer, who had earned the President's high regard by 
his work as Ambassador to Russia at the time of the 
Portsmouth Treaty, succeeded Cortelyou as Postmaster- 
General on March 4, 1907. 

William H. Taft had performed his duties as Governor- 
General of the Philippines with singular ability, and was 
well qualified for the position of Secretary of War, which 
he held from the day of his appointment until he received 
the Republican nomination for the Presidency in June, 
1908. Upon his resignation his place was filled by General 

17 



258 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Luke E. Wright, of Tennessee, who had served with him 
as Vice-Governor of the Philippines. 

Oscar S. Straus, of New York, was, during Roosevelt's 
second term, the only member of the Cabinet who had not 
had previous experience under the President. He was 
Chairman of the National Civic Federation and was an 
independent Republican, who had until lately been a 
Democrat. 

This was a remarkable group of men, whose ability 
and character were a tribute to the President's judgment 
in choosing his fellow workers. It is no wonder that Mr. 
Bryce, the British Ambassador, told Roosevelt that 
though he had studied intimately the governments of 
many different countries, he had "never in any country 
seen a more eager, high-minded and efficient set of public 
servants, men more useful and creditable to their country, 
than the men then doing the work of the American 
Government in Washington and in the field." 



CHAPTER XVn 

What He Did for the Navy 

COLONEL ROOSEVELT held, and so expressed 
himself in his autobiography, that the two Ameri- 
can achievements that impressed foreign people 
during the first dozen years of the twentieth century 
were the digging of the Panama Canal and the cruise of 
the battle fleet around the world. 

In speaking of the growth of the Navy during the 
period that he was its Commander-in-Chief he said: "Our 
Army and Navy, and above all our people, learned some 
lessons from the Spanish War and applied them to our 
uses. During the following decade the improvement in our 
Navy and Army was very great; not in material only, but 
also in personnel, and, above all, in the ability to handle 
our forces in good-sized units. By 1908, when our battle 
fleet steamed around the world, the Navy had become in 
every respect as fit a fighting instrument as any other 
Navy in the world, fleet for fleet. Even in size there 
was but one nation — England — which was completely 
out of our class : and in view of our relations with Eng- 
land and all the English-speaking peoples, this was of no 
consequence." 

The year 1898, in which he had left the position of 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy to help organize the 
Rough Riders, had proved a turning point in the history 
of the Nation. With the conclusion of the Spanish-Ameri- 
can War, America found herself in a new international 
position. New colonies brought new responsibilities. 

(259) 



260 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Porto Rico was added to our territories and we assumed a 
protectorate over Cuba. In the Pacific, the Philippines 
and Hawaii, as well as Guam and several smaller islands 
were annexed. The United States thus assumed a new 
position as a world power, and with this came the devel- 
opment of a new foreign policy. No one appreciated these 
new responsibilities that had come to the Nation more 
than Mr. Roosevelt. As he stated, in his second inaugural 
address, "much has been given to us and much will right- 
fully be expected of us. . . . Power means responsibility 

and danger We have become a great Nation, 

forced by the fact of its greatness into relations with other 
nations of the earth." 

Always Roosevelt was essentially a "Navy man." 
The first book that he ever wrote, back in 1882, was "The 
Naval Operations of the War Between Great Britain and 
the United States." Always he was a close student of 
naval affairs. Long before he embarked upon the public 
life of national leadership he knew the relative strengths of 
the navies of the world, their building programs, the 
personnel of their fleets and the minutest detail in regard 
to their armaments. When he came to the position of 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy he carried with him the 
conviction that "the strong arm of the government in 
enforcing respect for its just rights in international mat- 
ters is the Navy of the United States." While he served 
in that capacity he had the opportunity to study the Navy 
at close quarters and to acquire that expert knowledge 
that was to profit him greatly in a few years in the 
upbuilding of the greater Navy that came as a logical 
sequence to the expansion of our position as a world 
power. 

With his elevation to the Presidency, one of the most 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 261 

forceful of his initial utterances was his pronouncement in 
favor of a greater Navy, on the ground "that it is not 
possible to improvise a navy after war breaks out." In his 
first message to Congress, December 3, 1901, he declared 
"that the work of upbuilding our Navy must be steadily 
continued." He avowed "that no one point of our policy, 
foreign or domestic, is more important than this to the 
honor and material welfare, and above all to the peace, 
of our Nation in the future. Whether we desire it or not 
we must henceforth recognize that we have international 
duties no less than international rights. Even if our flag 
were hauled down in the Philippines and Porto Rico, 
even if we decided not to build the Isthmian Canal, we 
should need a thoroughly trained Navy of adequate size, 
or else be prepared definitely and for all time to abandon 
the idea that our Nation is among those whose sons go 
down to the sea in ships. Unless our commerce is always 
to be carried in foreign bottoms, we must have war craft 
to protect it." 

The American Navy at that time had nine battleships 
and eight more in course of construction. With the laconic 
statement that an adequate navy "is the best guarantee 
against war and the best insurance for peace," Roosevelt 
urged the construction of additional battleships and 
armored cruisers, with auxiliary and lighter craft in 
proportion. He advocated the policy of "wear out rather 
than rust out." He believed in the training of the per- 
sonnel in frequent fleet maneuvers "under a thorough 
and well -planned system of progressive instruction." 
For the first time in our history, naval maneuvers under 
the immediate command of an Admiral of the United 
States Navy were held on a large scale during the year 
1002. Firm in his belief that "the only shots that count 



%m THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

are the shots that hit," President Roosevelt pressed upon 
Congress the need of providing our fleets not only with 
ships, but with the facilities for making expert the man 
behind the gun. 

Even with the lessons of the Spanish-American War 
fresh in their minds, our people were, in a measure, as 
evidenced by the attitude of their representatives in 
Congress, reluctant to approve extensive naval appro- 
priations, particularly for the extensive fleet maneuvers 
and target practices that Roosevelt so earnestly advocated. 
Our naval construction program at this time was confined 
to the building of one new additional battleship a year, 
with the replacement of worn-out ships as they passed 
out of service. Roosevelt was content for the time with 
this program, though he used the building of the Panama 
Canal and the widening of the "open door" in the Orient 
to impress on the people the new and growing importance 
of the Navy. "There is no more patriotic duty before us 
as a people than to keep the Navy adequate to the needs 
of this country's position," he wrote in his message to 
Congress on December 6, 1904. "We have undertaken 
to build the Isthmian Canal. We have undertaken to 
secure for ourselves our just share in the trade of the 
Orient. We have undertaken to protect our citizens in 
foreign lands. We continue steadily to insist on the 
application of the Monroe Doctrine to the Western 
Hemisphere. Unless our attitude in these and all similar 
matters is to be a mere boastful sham we can not afford 
to abandon our naval program." 

The Russo-Japanese War gave a striking emphasis to 
the admonitions of the President. Lessons of the conflict 
were apparent to all critical naval observers. It was 
brought out that not a single battleship had been sunk 






WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 263 

by torpedo fire or gunnery, while many cruisers had gone 
down under the heavy guns of the big ships. It was 
pointed out that while the torpedo-boats were indispen- 
sable and the fast, light-armored cruisers very useful, the 
main reliance was to be placed upon battleships, heavily 
armored and heavily gunned. Upon this showing, Mr. 
Roosevelt urged the building of more battleships, or 
"ships so powerfully armed that they can inflict the 
maximum of damage upon our opponents, and so well 
protected that they can suffer a severe hammering in 
return without fatal impairment of their ability to fight 
and maneuver." In these contentions the President was 
backed up by his naval advisers and, as a consequence, by 
the close of his first term, had the satisfaction of seeing 
the American Navy not only raised to a position second 
only to Great Britain in the point of naval armaments, 
but girded to hold its high place through the years to 
follow. 

Elected again to the Presidency, he marked with 
pleasure the development of the Hague tribunal "as not 
only a sympton of growing closeness of relationship, but 
a means by which the growth can be furthered." But he 
held that disarmament can never be of prime importance, 
saying, "There is more need to get rid of the causes of war 
than of the implements of war." He laid special emphasis 
on the Monroe Doctrine in his annual message to Congress 
in 1905, saying "That our rights and interests are deeply 
concerned in the maintenance of the doctrine is so clear 
as hardly to need argument." As a precautionary mea- 
sure, in the interests of peace, he again urged the con- 
tinuance of the program for the "wear out and not rust 
out" of existing ships, and the continued replacement of 
obsolete types. 



264 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Again the following year the President drew upon the 
pages of history for a striking illustration in support of 
his naval policy. In his message to Congress he wrote: 
"The United States Navy is the surest guarantor of 
peace which this country possesses. It is earnestly to be 
wished that we would profit by the teachings of history in 
this matter. A strong and wise people will study its 
own failures no less than its triumphs, for there is wisdom 
to be learned from the study of both. For this purpose 
nothing could be more instructive than a rational study of 
the war of 1812, as it is told, for instance, by Captain 
Mahan. There was only one way by which the war could 
have been avoided. If during the preceding twelve years 
a navy relatively as strong as that which this country 
now has had been built up, and an army provided rela- 
tively as good as that which this country now has, there 
never would have been the slightest necessity of fighting 
the war; and if the necessity had arisen, the war would, 
under such circumstances, have ended with our speedy 
and overwhelming triumph. But our people, during those 
twelve years, refused to make any preparation whatever, 
regarding either the Army or Navy." 

The year 1907 brought a revolution in Mr. Roosevelt's 
plans for maintaining the Navy on a one-battleship-a-year 
program. His attitude in the matter is set forth in his mes- 
sage to Congress in which he said : "It was hoped that the 
Hague Conference might deal with the question of the lim- 
itation of armaments. But even before it had assembled 
informal inquiries had developed that as regards naval arm- 
aments, the only ones in which this country had any inter- 
est, it was hopeless to try to devise any plan for which there 
was the slightest possibility of securing the assent of the 
nations gathered at the Hague. No plan was even proposed 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 265 

which would have had the assent of more than one first- 
class power outside of the United States. The only plan 
that seemed at all feasible, that of limiting the size of 
battleships, met with no favor at all. It is evident, there- 
fore, that it is folly for this Nation to base any hope of 
securing peace on an international agreement as to the 
limitations of armaments. Such being the fact it would be 
most unwise for us to stop the upbuilding of our Navy. 
To build one battleship of the best and most advanced 
type in one year would barely keep our fleet up to its 
present force. This is not enough. In my judgment, we 
should this year provide for four battleships." 

In addition, the President urged even more thorough 
preparation of the men of the Navy, and of its auxiliaries, 
docks, coaling stations, colliers and supply ships. He 
advocated plenty of torpedo-boats and destroyers, and 
fortifications of the best type for all the great harbors on 
both the Atlantic and Pacific coasts. Four months after 
this message was delivered to Congress, he sent a special 
message to that body, on April 14, 1908, urging in more 
complete detail the four-battleship plan as against the 
one- or two-battleship program that had prevailed. 

It was in 1907, during the discussion with Japan of tlie 
exclusion of Japanese children from the public schools of 
California that the President decided to send the American 
battle fleet around the world. He took no counsel in the 
matter, but acted solely on his own initiative, not con- 
sulting either the members of his Cabinet or Congress. 
In June the newspapers reported that the President 
would despatch the fleet to the Pacific coast. The 
announcement created a sensation. Some newspapers 
openly declared such a move would end in war. His 
critics said he wanted a war. There was much speculation 



266 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

about the matter until finally all doubts as to the Pres- 
ident's intentions were swept away when the Secretary 
of the Navy, in an address at Oakland, California, on 
July 4th, announced that the American Navy shortly 
would visit the Pacific coast. Shortly afterward the 
Secretary of the Navy, Admiral Evans, Rear Admiral 
Brownson, Chief of the Bureau of Navigation, and other 
naval authorities, were summoned to a conference at 
Oyster Bay. Then a certain section of his critics were up 
in arms. In Washington the head of the Senate Com- 
mittee on Naval Affairs announced that the fleet should 
not and could not go because Congress would refuse to 
appropriate the necessary money. Roosevelt's answer 
was typical of him. He said he had money enough to 
send the fleet around to the Pacific coast, "and that if 
Congress didn't appropriate funds to bring it home it 
would stay there." After that, there was no further 
difficulty. 

European journals commented freely on the proposed 
voyage and almost without exception took the view that 
the cruise had some relation to the Japanese situation, as 
indeed it had, in the sense that that situation was one 
of several causes which led the President to decide that 
the voyage should be made, the other causes being his 
desire to afford the fleet sea practice, to demonstrate to 
other nations the efficiency of the American Navy, and, 
above all, to inspire the people of the United States with 
a practical enthusiasm for the Navy, so that they might 
thereafter take a greater interest in what he regarded as 
its proper development. 

The ships began assembling in Hampton Roads 
December 1, 1907, and in ten days were ready for their 
departure — the mightiest fleet the United States ever 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 267 

had assembled up to that time. President Roosevelt, 
accompanied by Mrs. Roosevelt and a distinguished 
company of guests, went down to Hampton Roads to see 
the fleet off. On the bridge of the Mayflower, he led the 
magnificent four-mile line of fighting vessels during the 
first stage of the voyage, from the anchorage grounds in 
Hampton Roads to the Horseshoe Bend of Chesapeake 
Bay. Then, when the wide reaches of the sea were visible, 
through the wide-swung capes of Virginia, he turned 
aside and, coming to anchorage, reviewed the passing 
pageant. 

There was not a ship in the line old enough to have 
smelled the powder or taken the shot of Manila or San- 
tiago. Every one of the sixteen battleships had been 
built since the Spanish-American War. All were of 
modern design and armament — examples of the aggressive 
sea-going navy which the President had declared to be so 
essential to the peace of the country. It was the new 
American Navy in great part created since Roosevelt had 
become President; and Roosevelt was proud of this 
showing. 

"Did you ever see such a fleet and such a day; by 
George, isn't it magnificent?" he chuckled as he paced 
rapidly up and down the deck of the Mayflower. 

"I tell you," he remarked to his friends, "our enlisted 
men are everything. They are perfectly bully and they 
are up to everything required of them. This is indeed a 
great fleet and a great day." 

The fleet that steamed out to sea under the leadership 
of Rear Admiral Robley D. Evans, of Spanish-American 
War fame, was divided into two squadrons of two divi- 
sions each. The first division was composed of the flag- 
ship Connecticut and the battleships Louisiana, Kansas 



268 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

and Vermont. The second division, commanded by Rear 
Admiral William H. Emery, comprised the battleships 
Georgia;, Virginia, New Jersey and Rhode Island. The 
third division, commanded by Rear Admiral C. M. 
Thomas, comprised the battleships Minnesota, Maine, 
Ohio and Missouri. The fourth division, commanded by 
Rear Admiral C. S. Sperry, comprised the battleships 
Alabama, Illinois, Kearsarge and Kentucky. The fleet 
auxiliaries were the supply ships Culgoa and Glacier, 
the repair ship Panther and the tender Yankton. Six 
torpedo-boats under Captain Cone rounded out the fleet. 

It had been generally supposed up to this time that 
the destination of the fleet was Magdalena Bay and pos- 
sibly a cruise along the Pacific coast as far as Seattle. 
But just before it steamed away the report was whispered 
about that certain charts pertaining to the Manila Islands 
and the Suez Canal had been shipped with other para- 
phernalia, and immediately the conclusion was reached 
that the mission of the fleet actually was a "round-the- 
world" trip. Hardly had Roosevelt returned to the 
White House from the farewell, when it was announced 
that the fleet would continue on to our insular possessions 
and return home by the Suez Canal. When the news was 
flashed to the far corners of the earth Australia and New 
Zealand, Japan and China, sent earnest invitations 
inviting the ships to pay them a friendly visit. They 
forthwith began preparing royal welcomes, and royal 
they subsequently proved. 

Without accident or untoward incident of any kind 
the fleet proceeded south along the Atlantic coast of 
South America. It touched at Port of Spain and then at 
Rio Janeiro. At the latter city it was received with signal 
honors and remained for a few days enjoying the hos- 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 269 

pitality of the enthusiastic Latin -Americans. Coal and 
supplies were taken on at these stops. When the Straits 
of Magellan were reached the skeptics were completely 
confounded, for the giant battleships negotiated the 
passageway, "where dwell the ghosts of many ships that 
had been battered to pieces on the rocks," without a 
single misfortune. Callao was reached in February, 1908. 
On the way up the west coast the ships engaged in their 
regular spring target practice and arriving finally in 
Magdalena Bay — by the permission of the Mexican 
government — spent thirty days in close competition. 
Navy Department records show that the marksmanship 
attained during these cruise practices excelled anything 
that had been chronicled up to that time. Of this 
important phase of the voyage, Admiral Sperry, who 
commanded the fleet after Admiral "Bob" Evans relin- 
quished the post of Commander-in-Chief at San Francisco, 
reported by letter to President Roosevelt: 

"As for the effect of the cruise upon the training, 
discipline and effectiveness of the fleet, the good cannot 
be exaggerated. It is a war game in every detail." He 
referred to the excellent opportunities offered for special- 
ization in wireless, gunnery, tactics, battle maneuvers and 
coal economy, and on the latter point emphasized the 
rivalry between the ships in the matter of keeping down 
coal consumption. "All this has been done," he con- 
cluded, "but the field is widening and work has only 
begun." 

President Roosevelt had touched on these things in his 
message to Congress, written just prior to the departure 
of the fleet. 

"The battle fleet is about departing by the Straits of 
Magellan to visit the Pacific coast," he wrote. "No fleet 



270 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of such size has ever made such a voyage, and it will be of 
very great educational use to all engaged in it. The only 
way by which to teach officers and men how to handle 
the fleet so as to meet every possible strain and emergency 
in time of war is to have them practice under similar 
conditions in time of peace. Moreover, the only way to 
find out our actual needs is to perform in time of peace 
whatever maneuvers might be necessary in time of war. 
After war is declared it is too late to find out the needs; 
that means to invite disaster. This trip to the Pacific will 
show what some of our needs are and will enable us to 
provide for them. The proper place for an officer to learn 
his duty is at sea, and the only way in which a navy can 
ever be made efficient is by practice at sea, under all the 
conditions that would have to be met if war existed. . . . 
The United States Navy is the best guaranty the nation 
has that its honor and interest will not be neglected; and 
in addition it offers by far the best insurance for peace 
that can by human ingenuity be devised." 

When the fleet reached San Francisco Admiral Evans 
retired and Rear Admiral C. S. Sperry assumed control, 
to remain in charge until the ships were safely anchored 
home again in Hampton Roads. From the Golden Gate 
the ships moved out over the Pacific to Honolulu. The 
battleships Alabama and Maine dropped out and their 
places were taken by the newer ships Wisconsin and 
Nebraska. The six destroyers separated from the main 
fleet at San Francisco and after visiting Samoa returned 
home. 

In the Pacific and Indian Oceans the Americans met 
everywhere with a cordial welcome. The American flag 
was warmly greeted and nowhere was there any 
unpleasant feature to mar the program of the visitors. 




^wmUnders^chief of the navy and of the fleet 

ton Roads, February 21, 1909. 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 271 

Auckland, Sydney and Melbourne made good their 
invitations in gracious style. Yokohama showed not the 
slightest resentment over the coming of the huge Pacific 
touring party. The "open door" that had been extended 
to Perry in 1853 was even more widely extended. Suez 
was reached the third day of January, 1909, and when the 
fleet heard of the appalling disaster caused by the earth- 
quake in Sicily and southern Italy several of the American 
battleships under the direction of Admiral Speny pro- 
ceeded to the stricken country and helped in the work 
of relief. 

The good effects of the cruise were apparent to the 
men of the Navy even before the country at large had 
come to know its value . Starting out as sixteen individual 
units the fleet had become welded as one body. Roosevelt 
had said that Spain's inability to equip her ships properly 
with coal and ammunition had contributed to her failure 
in 1898. It had been reasoned also that in the event of 
a war that would take our battleships into the Pacific 
they would arrive demoralized as did the Russian ships 
in 1904 after their long trip culminating in the battle of 
Japan Sea. The cruise round the world dissipated all 
doubts as to the American Navy's ability to take care of 
itself under all conditions and under any assignment that 
might be made of it, regardless of distance. The fleet had 
proved self-sustaining in repairs, and the Bureau of 
Equipment at Washington had been able to solve the 
problems of coal and general supplies. The need of certain 
improvements was demonstrated, notably the necessity 
of providing our own colliers that could not be gotten 
from other nations in time of war because of neutrality 
laws. In general, as one historian has put it, "the fleet 
had found itself, the men had got the 'sea-habit,' and the 



272 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

vast aggregation had become a unit in a sense such as had 
scarcely ever been realized before." 

From Gibraltar the fleet proceeded across the Atlantic 
flying "homeward bound" pennants. The great ships 
that had steamed out of Hampton Roads in December 
1907 arrived back again within the same Virginian capes 
on February 22, 1909, the anniversary of the birth of 
The Father of Our Country. The Nation gave her 
returned champions of peace a notable welcome. 
President Roosevelt, who had only a few days of his term 
remaining until the inauguration of President-elect Taft, 
again made the journey to Hampton Roads to congratu- 
late Admiral Sperry and his men on the splendid showing 
they had made during their sixteen months' tour in foreign 
waters. 

"This is the first battle fleet that has ever circum- 
navigated the globe. Those who perform the feat again 
can but follow in your footsteps," he told them. Sum- 
ming up his address the President said: "As a war 
machine the fleet comes back in better shape than it 
went out. In addition, you, the officers and men of this 
formidable fighting force, have shown yourselves the best 
of all possible ambassadors and heralds of peace. Wher- 
ever you have landed you have borne yourselves so as to 
make us at home proud of being your countrymen. You 
have shown that the best type of fighting man of the sea 
knows how to appear to the utmost possible advantage 
when his business is to behave himself on shore, and to 
make a good impression in a foreign land. We are proud 
of all the ships and all the men in the whole fleet, and we 
welcome you home to the country whose good repute 
among nations has been raised by what you have done." 

"Not until some American fleet returns victorious 



WHAT HE DID FOR THE NAVY 273 

from a great sea battle will there be another such home- 
coming, another such sight as this. I drink to the Amer- 
ican Navy ! " This was the toast of President Roosevelt as 
he stood, radiantly happy, in the cabin of the Mayflower 
at the conclusion of the review in Hampton Roads. He 
was surrounded by the admirals and captains of the 
sixteen ships that had just been welcomed home. 

"We stay-at-homes also drink to the men who have 
made us prouder than ever of our country," added the 
President, and again the toast was pledged. 

He was elated over the showing of the fleet and took 
occasion to remind the naval leaders of the dire proph- 
ecies that had been made as to the success of the 
venture. "Do you remember the prophecies of disaster?'* 
he asked. "Well, here they are," pointing to the ships in 
the harbor, "returning after fourteen months without a 
scratch. Isn't it magnificent?" 

In turn he visited the four division flagships of the 
big fleet and everywhere was cheered by the sailors. 
"You have done the trick," he exclaimed to one group of 
admirers. "Other nations may follow, but they've got to 
go behind." 

The cheering broke out afresh when the President 
declared of the cruise that "nobody after this will forget 
that the American coast is on the Pacific as well as on the 
Atlantic." 

At the time the fleet was making ready for its 
memorable cruise, the President had seen fit to remain 
silent on any possible political or diplomatic significance 
that the voyage might have. Subsequently, however, 
speaking of the broader significance of the voyage, he 
said that it was the most important service that he had 
rendered to peace. 

18 



CHAPTER XVIII 

Big Business and Labor 

WHEN Roosevelt became President in 1901, the 
foremost political problem of the country was 
the problem of big business. During the nine- 
teenth century the American business man had grown 
accustomed to receiving from the national government 
assistance, but never restraint. Vast combinations of 
capital had sprung up to control the necessaries of life. 
The great corporations which produced and sold such 
articles as steel, oil, sugar and beef were widely and 
cordially hated. The campaign literature of the time was 
full of the subject, and the corpulent silk-hatted citizen 
who represented the Trusts was a familiar figure in the 
cartoons. 

In Roosevelt's first message to Congress, on December 
3, 1901, he called attention to the situation. No legis- 
lation was available for the proper restraint of corpora- 
tions doing business between the states except the 
Sherman Act of 1890, and by the decision of the Supreme 
Court in the famous Knight case of 1895, the strength of 
this act had been largely impaired. The President 
realized that the first essential was publicity. "In the 
interest of the public," he said in his message, "the 
government should have the right to inspect and examine 
the workings of the great corporations engaged in inter- 
state business." 

In accordance with his request, Congress finally 
passed the act of February 14, 1903, creating the new 

(274) 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 275 

Department of Commerce and Labor. This department 
included a Bureau of Corporations, presided over by a 
Commissioner. The duty of the bureau was to investi- 
gate the organization, conduct and management of 
corporations engaged in interstate and foreign commerce, 
and to compile and publish the results of their investi- 
gations. James R. Garfield was the first Commissioner 
of the new bureau. When he finally became Secretary of 
the Interior he was succeeded by Herbert Knox Smith. 
Both of these men enjoyed the confidence of the Presi- 
dent to an unusual degree, and the work which they did 
under his direction was of great and lasting value. The 
bureau first investigated such enterprises as the Standard 
Oil Company, the American Tobacco Company and the 
United States Steel Corporation. Upon the completion 
of each investigation an exhaustive report was made to 
the President. At the same time a summary of the 
report, covering not more than two newspaper columns, 
was prepared and was released by the President for 
publication in the press throughout the country. Thus 
he gathered a mass of information on great public eco- 
nomic questions and went direct to the people with it. 
His actions raised storms of approval and criticism; 
they became the subjects of editorials, of cartoons and of 
private and public comment all over the country, and 
they placed the entire problem of American industry on 
a new level for intelligent discussion. 

The Sherman Act was the only statutory weapon with 
which to attack unlawful combinations. In the Knight 
case the Supreme Court had decided that a corporation 
in one state could lawfully acquire all the stock of a 
corporation in another state and thus effectually secure 
control of a given business. Shortly before Roosevelt 



276 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

became President, an arrangement was made by certain 
financiers, to obtain control of the railway systems in the 
Northwest. It was planned to form a corporation to be 
called the Northern Securities Company. This corpora- 
tion was to be nothing but a holding company; that is, it 
was to exist simply for the purpose of owning the stock of 
the principal railroads of the Northwest. The lawfulness 
of this scheme was apparently settled by the Knight 
decision. 

Attorney-General Knox advised the President that an 
effort should be made to obtain a new and different 
decision of the question. Upon Roosevelt's direction, 
therefore, suit was brought to dissolve the Northern 
Securities Company, and the Supreme Court in 1904, 
by a vote of five to four, decided in favor of the govern- 
ment. This was a great moral victory and gave to the 
administration and to the people new confidence in the 
possibility of restraining monopolies. It led to a series of 
suits against the General Paper Company, the so-called 
Beef Trust, the Standard Oil Company, the American 
Tobacco Company and many others. Although the 
President was successful in most of these cases, the 
immediate effect of the litigation was less important than 
the gradual growth of the conviction that the regulation 
of vast business enterprises belonged properly to the 
Federal government. 

But the power given the President by the Sherman 
law, and the facts gathered for him by the Bureau of 
Corporations, did not meet all the requirements of the 
situation. As time went on and the problem of big 
business pressed more and more upon his attention, the 
President became convinced that executive regulation 
should take the place of judicial regulation. "The mon- 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 277 

opolies," he said, "can, although in rather cumbrous 
fashion, be broken up by lawsuits. Great business com- 
binations, however, cannot possibly be made useful 
instead of noxious industrial agencies merely by lawsuits, 
and especially by lawsuits supposed to be carried on for 
their destruction and not for their control and regulation." 
During the latter half of his administration he repeatedly 
urged Congress to create a Federal agency for the regula- 
tion of all the great interstate corporations, including 
adequate publicity and supervision of the issue of secu- 
rities. He was convinced that big combinations had 
come to stay and that they should be regulated and not 
destroyed. As he remarked in conversation to some of his 
friends, "If you have a high-spirited horse that occasion- 
ally runs away, there are two remedies. You can put a 
curb bit on him and hold him down; or you can take an 
axe and knock him on the head and kill him. Either way 
he won't run again." He favored the use of the bit rather 
than the axe. 

In the numberless conferences between the President 
and his subordinates, there were thrashed over all sorts 
of plans for the control of corporate power, through 
national supervision. There was the national incorpo- 
ration plan, which had too many legal difficulties; the 
Federal license plan, which would have required the 
large corporations engaged in interstate commerce to 
secure a Federal license for that privilege, and to comply 
with various conditions attached to the license, and there 
was the Federal Trade Commission plan. 

The substance of all these plans was the same. The 
President was convinced, as he said in a special message 
of April 27, 1908, that "some body or bodies in the 
executive service should be given power to pass upon 



278 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

any combination or agreement in relation to interstate 
commerce, and every such combination or agreement 
not thus approved should be treated as in violation of 
law, and prosecuted accordingly. The issuance of the 
securities of any combination doing business should be 
under the supervision of the national government." 

But Congress was not willing to go as far as the 
President asked, and he was bitterly assailed by the 
beneficiaries of the large vested interests. His proposal 
was denounced as the wild dream of a mad enemy of 
property and of the social order. But he was, in fact, the 
friend of property, not its enemy. 

As he said himself, " One great problem that we have 
before us is to preserve the rights of property; these can 
only be preserved if we remember that they are in less 
jeopardy from the socialist and the anarchist than from 
the predatory man of wealth." He never denounced 
wealth itself but only the unsocial acquisition or use of it. 

Few incidents of his administration were more pictur- 
esque and more far-reaching in their consequences than 
the prosecution of the western land frauds. During the 
year 1903, there was revealed a colossal scheme to steal 
government lands in the West. A group of Calif ornians had 
made a practice of securing title to public land by fraud 
and forgery. The criminals were men of high position. 
Two United States Senators, Burton of Kansas and 
Mitchell of Oregon, were convicted of participation in 
similar schemes. Mitchell, although a member of the 
United States Senate, received fees for arguing land 
cases. When charged with this offense, he produced a 
contract with his partner which showed that the partner 
received all of the fees in such cases. The contract was 
typewritten on a piece of water-marked paper and bore 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 279 

a date which was some time prior to the beginning of the 
government's investigation. The prosecution proved 
that paper with that particular water-mark had not been 
procurable at the time when the contract was said to 
have been made, and that the same was true of the style 
of typewriter ribbon which had been used. The discovery 
of these facts resulted in a full confession by the man who 
had written and antedated the bogus contract at the 
direction of his two employers. 

When the great transcontinental railways were built, 
they received for their encouragement sections of land 
from the national government. Between each pair of 
sections so given, the government reserved a section to 
itself, so that many square miles of the West were divided 
like a checkerboard between public and private owner- 
ship. The great cattle companies bought these sections 
from the railroads and then proceeded to fence in the 
entire tract including government land as well as railroad 
land. When settlers came to take up homesteads upon 
those sections which formed part of the public domain, 
they found themselves surrounded by unlawfully built 
fences and were, in some cases, intimidated and even 
killed when they tried to assert their rights. It was 
estimated that five million acres were thus illegally fenced. 
Under Roosevelt's direction this evil was attacked in the 
criminal courts and numerous convictions of the guilty 
parties were obtained. 

In these land cases, the outstanding figure, beside the 
President himself, was Francis J. Heney, who was 
appointed a special United States District Attorney at 
Portland, Oregon, and whose brilliant and tireless work 
was principally responsible for the government's success. 

Another story well illustrates Roosevelt's relentless 



280 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

pursuit of "the predatory man of wealth." This is the 
story of the great sugar frauds. In 1904 a government 
employee named Richard Parr came to the President's 
Secretary, William Loeb, Jr., and told him that he 
suspected that the American Sugar Refining Company 
was defrauding the government in the collection of 
import duties. The matter was reported to the President 
and upon his direction Parr received a special appointment 
in the Treasury Department. He was finally assigned to 
work upon the New York docks in March, 1907. 

Working with an assistant, he arrived, after some 
weeks, at the definite conclusion that fraud was somehow 
being practiced upon the government. Each lot of sugar 
as it was unloaded from the ships was weighed on a 
large platform scale. At the edge of the scale a government 
weigher and a company checker sat side by side. Parr's 
assistant noticed that whenever a lot of sugar was 
put on the scales the company checker reached down to 
one side in a peculiar manner with his left hand. Parr 
discovered that on the side of each of the seventeen scales 
there was a small hole containing a spring, and that by 
pressure on this spring with his left hand the company 
checker reduced the weight of every load of sugar that 
went on the scales. Of course, since the amount of duty 
was based on the weight of sugar, this practice resulted in 
cheating the United States out of part of the duties. The 
practice had been going on for six years, and it was 
estimated that the American Sugar Refining Company 
had escaped duties on seventy-five million pounds of 
sugar during that time. 

The result of this investigation was the conviction 
of those immediately responsible for the fraud, and the 
payment by the Sugar Company to the government of 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 281 

two million dollars in settlement of the claim for past 
duties. Throughout the whole case Roosevelt kept in 
close touch with what was going on. On one occasion an 
attempt was made to get Parr out of the way, but the 
President took the matter in hand and directed Secretary 
Cortelyou to see that Parr was retained until he completed 
his investigation. Henry L. Stimson, United States 
District Attorney at New York, took charge of the civil 
and criminal proceedings with complete success. The 
President allowed nothing to stand in the way of the 
investigation and no official of the company was so 
highly placed as to relieve him of prosecution. 

Roosevelt's enemies among the "malefactors of great 
wealth" represented him as the tireless and consistent 
enemy of all great combinations of property. The story 
of his connection with the Tennessee Coal and Iron 
matter is, in itself, a refutation of such a charge. 

The famous panic of 1907 began on October 22d, 
when the Knickerbocker Trust Company of New York 
closed its doors. A run on other New York trust com- 
panies immediately began and in a short time the panic 
had extended through the entire country and threatened 
wide-spread disaster. The President and Secretary 
Cortelyou of the Treasury kept in hourly communication 
with New York and from time to time took such action 
as they thought might serve to allay the panic. The 
situation, however, rapidly grew critical. 

On Monday, November 4th, as the President was at 
breakfast, he was informed that Henry C. Frick and 
Judge E. H. Gary, representing the United States Steel 
Corporation, were waiting to see him in the Executive 
office. He immediately joined them and asked Mr. 
Root, the Secretary of State, to be present at the inter- 



282 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

view in the absence of Attorney-General Bonaparte. 
Frick and Gary told him that an important New York 
firm was on the verge of failure and would undoubtedly 
go under during the ensuing week unless help came. This 
firm owned the majority of the stock of the Tennessee 
Coal and Iron Company, which at the time had little or 
no market value. It had been suggested that the United 
States Steel Corporation should buy this stock, paying 
for it with its own stock which was of undoubted strength 
and value. Gary and Frick represented to the President 
that they wished to do this not primarily for the purpose 
of enlarging the Steel Corporation's holdings, but for the 
purpose of averting a further spread of the panic. Before 
taking such a step, however, they wished the President's 
assurance that it would not form the basis of an attack 
upon the Steel Corporation for a violation of the Anti- 
Trust Law. 

The President had to make up his mind immediately 
so that the suggested action, if taken, might be announced 
at the opening of the New York Stock Exchange that 
morning. The United States Steel Corporation owned 
less than sixty per cent of the steel properties in the 
United States and the acquisition of the Tennessee 
property would not raise this proportion above sixty per 
cent. The President realized the value of the suggested 
course of action and did not feel that such a slight increase 
in the size of the corporation's holdings could effect the 
determination of the question of monopoly. Accordingly, 
before the interview closed, he dictated a note to the 
Attorney-General setting forth the facts as I have related 
them, and stating that Gary and Frick had told him that 
they did not want to buy the stock if he thought that it 
ought not to be done. "I answered," he said, "that while 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 283 

of course I could not advise them to take the action 
proposed, I felt it no public duty of mine to interpose 
any objections." 

The same morning Mr. Bonaparte came to see the 
President, acknowledged receipt of the note and concurred 
in his judgment in the matter. The Tennessee stock 
was bought by the Steel Corporation, and by this means 
an important step was taken in the checking of the panic. 
Some time after the danger was safely passed, attacks 
upon the President began for his share in what had 
happened. He was accused of favoring the Steel Corpo- 
ration and was bitterly assailed from many quarters. 
But he had as a memorandum his note to the Attorney- 
General, which, together with the openness of the entire 
transaction, effectually refuted any charge of unfairness. 

Roosevelt was the consistent friend of labor, but not 
so as to prevent his friendship with capital also. "The 
White House doors," he said, "will open just as easily 
to the laboring man as to the capitalist — and no easier." 
He repeatedly stated his belief in the usefulness of labor 
organizations. He advocated the employers' liability act, 
shorter hours of work on the railroads, a workmen's 
compensation law, child labor laws, and other measures 
for the benefit of the man who works with his hands. 
But he was careful never to pose as primarily the friend 
and champion of labor. His principle was that labor and 
capital alike should have the square deal. "More than 
that," he said, "no man is entitled to, and less than that 
no man shall have." 

When William A. Miller was discharged from the 
Government Printing Office, because he was a non-union 
man, the President took the matter up personally, and 
ordered Miller to be reinstated. Samuel Gompers, with 



284 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the members of the Executive Council of the American 
Federation of Labor, called to protest. He told them that 
his decision was final and said : " I must govern my action 
by the laws of the land, which I am sworn to administer, 
and which differentiate any case in which the Government 
of the United States is a party from all other cases 
whatsoever. These laws are enacted for the benefit of the 
whole people, and can not and must not be construed as 
permitting discrimination against some of the people." 

Here was a splendid chance to win the sympathy and 
the votes of labor simply by permitting the discharge 
of Miller to stand, but Roosevelt never reckoned the 
effect of any public action on his own career. He did 
what he thought right and let the consequences take 
care of themselves. 

His campaign to bring the great corporations within 
the power of the Federal government incurred for him 
the enmity of many of the beneficiaries of big business. 
On the other hand, his insistence upon the lawful rights 
of property, and his condemnation of violent and extra- 
legal attacks upon property, earned for him the denun- 
ciations of the labor extremists. During the winter of 
1907, the attacks of both of these classes were directed 
upon him. He had incurred the hatred of the reaction- 
aries by his trust program. The extremists on the other 
side hated him because of the Moyer-Haywood-Pettibone 
affair. 

In 1899 Governor Frank Steunenberg, of Idaho, had 
called in the United States troops to repress disorder in 
the Coeur de'Alene mining district. The troops employed 
the most drastic measures and drove hundreds of miners 
out of the country. Among these was one named Harry 
Orchard. Six years later, on December 30, 1905, as 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 285 

Steunenberg was leaving his house at Caldwell, Idaho, he 
was blown to pieces by a bomb which had been placed 
beneath his gate. Orchard was arrested on suspicion 
and confessed the crime. He had on his person papers 
showing his connection with the Western Federation of 
Miners, and apparently implicating Charles H. Moyer, 
the president of that organization, William D. Haywood, 
its secretary and treasurer, and George A. Pettibone, 
a member of its executive committee. 

These three men were in Colorado, and the authorities 
of Idaho resorted to an extraordinary and high-handed 
proceeding to bring them back to the scene of the crime. 
Although they were in no sense fugitives from justice, 
the Governor of Colorado was persuaded secretly to 
honor a requisition; and upon Saturday night, after the 
courts were closed, and a writ of habeas corpus was 
probably unobtainable, the three men were kidnapped and 
hurried on a special train to Idaho without an oppor- 
tunity to consult counsel, or to notify their families. This 
enterprise later received the sanction of the United States 
Supreme Court, and Moyer, Haywood and Pettibone 
consequently had to await their trial in Idaho. Meanwhile, 
of course, excitement in the whole mining country ran 
high. The Western Federation of Miners, which was an 
off-shoot of the Industrial Workers of the World, numbered 
among its members and officers a number of men who 
were ready to go to any extreme to attain their objects. 
In the neighboring State of Nevada, the gold-field mining 
district became divided into two hostile camps. The 
miners, whose anger had been aroused by the treatment 
of the officers of their organization, constantly clashed 
with the watchmen and guards who were armed and 
paid by the owners of the mines. It was in this state of 



286 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

affairs that the President, in a letter, alluded to Mr. 
Harriman, the railroad magnate, and to Moyer, Haywood, 
and Debs, as being equally "undesirable citizens." He 
was immediately attacked by the Wall Street newspapers 
on the one hand, and by what he termed "miscalled 
socialists who had anarchistic leanings," on the other. 
He bore these attacks in silence until he received from 
Honore Jaxson, of Chicago, chairman of the Cook 
County Moyer-Haywood-Pettibone Conference, a letter 
which he could not forbear to answer. In this letter 
Jaxson protested vehemently that the President was 
attempting to influence in advance the trial of Moyer 
and his associates. 

The President's answer was characteristic, and the 
satisfaction which, it gave him to write it is apparent in 
every line. He observed that his correspondent's letter 
bore the headlines: "Death — cannot — will not — and shall 
not claim our brothers!" and suggested that this 
announced in advance an intention to tolerate only one 
verdict in the case. As to his own language, he said: "It 
is simple absurdity to suppose that because any man is 
on trial for a given offense, he is, therefore, to be freed 
from all criticism upon his general conduct and manner of 
life." He repeated that he considered Messrs. Moyer and 
Haywood undesirable citizens, and concluded thus: "So 
far as in my power lies I shall uphold justice, whether the 
man accused of guilt has behind him the wealthiest 
corporations, the greatest aggregations of riches in the 
country, or whether he has behind him the most influ- 
ential labor organizations in the country." 

After a long trial Haywood was acquitted on July 28, 
1907, for lack of evidence. The only testimony against 
him was that of Harry Orchard, the self-confessed 



BIG BUSINESS AND LABOR 287 

murderer. But this did not end the agitation in the 
mining districts. The situation in Nevada grew more and 
more acute until Governor Sparks felt unable to handle 
it any longer. The Legislature of Nevada had failed to 
provide for a State Police and the Governor finally asked 
for Federal intervention. On December 7, 1907, the 
United States troops arrived from California and order 
was immediately restored. Then the Governor wanted 
the army to stay indefinitely to do his police work for 
him, but the President had no such idea. He had, on 
December 11th, sent a commission consisting of Lawrence 
O. Murray, Assistant Secretary of Commerce and Labor, 
Charles P. Neill, Commissioner of Labor, and Herbert 
Knox Smith, Commissioner of Corporations, to inves- 
tigate, with the hope of finally allaying the difficulty. 
To Governor Sparks' request he replied, on December 
28th, that if the Governor would immediately call a session 
of the Legislature for the purpose of establishing a State 
Police he would order the troops to stay for a short while, 
but that if the Legislature were not convened the troops 
would return to California immediately. The result was 
that the Governor called an extra session of the Legis- 
lature, the State Police Act was passed and the troops 
withdrew, leaving the locality reasonably quiet. 

Roosevelt's attitude toward big business and toward 
labor was simplicity itself. The average citizen under- 
stood it and approved it. Neither wealth nor poverty 
was to him a recommendation in itself. Neither trusts 
nor labor unions were exempt from the restraints of the 
law. Trust magnate and labor agitator, capitalist and 
wage-earner, they were all alike American citizens, to 
whom he sought only to apply the rule of even-handed 
justice. 



CHAPTER XIX 

Conservation of Natural Resources 

OF all the movements which Roosevelt preached, 
and launched and put into practice perhaps the 
most far-reaching in its permanent importance 
was "the conservation of natural resources." More 
than any other it received his constant and sympa- 
thetic attention. The word conservation came into 
general use during the latter part of his second ad- 
ministration, to denote foresight and restraint in man's 
use of the primary sources of wealth — the earth's surface, 
the forests and waters upon it, the minerals beneath it, 
and their incidents, and to denote the securing of their 
highest utilization and their equal enjoyment by all the 
people of present and future generations. 

But the foresight and restraint of the individual is 
helpless before the destructive and monopolizing power 
of modern industrialism equipped by science, organized 
in vast masses of capital and stimulated by the short- 
sighted greed of unrestricted competition. Therefore 
Roosevelt insisted that they must be controlled by 
public authority wherever constitutionally possible. 

So long as he was in the White House, no influence 
however powerful could reach and dislodge the honest, 
energetic, and competent subordinate whom the struggle 
for national control had brought into conflict with 
powerful water-power or timber grabbers, with coal 
barons, or with fraudulent absorbers of the public lands. 
His intense interest in the matter brought bureau cjiiefs, 

(288) 



CONSERVATION 289 

and officials even lower, into personal touch with him 
where other Presidents have been limited to Cabinet 
officers, often of smaller caliber than their subordinates. 

The beginnings of what afterward grew into conser- 
vation, had been laid in two fields of Federal activity 
before Roosevelt became President — irrigation and for- 
estry; and this chapter could not be intelligently 
written, unless the story of his active induction into the 
pursuit of conservation were coupled with the names of 
two Pennsylvanians — Gifford Pinchot, the founder of 
the United States Forest Service, and F. H. Newell, 
founder of the United States Reclamation Service. 

Hardly had Roosevelt come to Washington in Sep- 
tember, 1901, when conservation was brought to his 
attention by Pinchot and Newell. They wanted him 
to adopt the reclamation of arid lands as his first 
policy and to secure the passage of a reclamation act 
that would make millions of acres of desert bloom, and 
yield not only food but homes and vigorous citizens. 

To this end they suggested that the United States 
itself should build the reservoirs, canals and ditches 
of irrigation systems, often costing millions of dollars. 
They pointed out that private enterprise was not equal 
to such a gigantic task, and that only the government 
could be trusted to allot the reclaimed land and the 
necessary water-rights to bona fide settlers on just terms. 
It was vitally important that the right to the water 
should be turned over to the irrigation settler as part and 
parcel of his land, so that no perpetual tribute could be 
exacted from him and his children for that which is as 
necessary to irrigated land as the rain clouds are to our 
Eastern farms. 

Seeing all this as only a man familiar with Western 

19 



290 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

conditions could see it, Roosevelt asked Pinchot and 
Newell to prepare a passage relating to the subject for 
his first message to Congress, in December, 1901. Later, 
his backing of the bill for a Reclamation Service, prepared 
and introduced with his approval, was so vigorous that 
the Reclamation Act became a law in June, 1902, against 
the opposition of the usual quota of reactionary Congress- 
men. Newell was promptly put in charge of the service. 

By the close of Roosevelt's administration $80,000,000 
had been spent to reclaim many acres of arid public 
lands on which there have been established thousands 
of farm homes of strong American citizens, and hundreds 
of smiling villages and towns. All the money spent is 
required by the law to be returned to the government 
in reasonably small yearly instalments. 

The President's right-hand man in all these matters 
was Gifford Pinchot. During his entire Presidency, 
the doors of the White House and of his mind and heart 
were gladly open to the Forester at all times and to 
any extent. Of Pinchot, he has said : 

"Gifford Pinchot is the man to whom the nation 
owes most for what has been accomplished as regards 
the preservation of the natural resources of our country. 
He led, and indeed, during its most vital period 
embodied, the fight for the preservation, through use 
of our forests. He played one of the leading parts in 
the effort to make the national government the chief 
instrument in developing the irrigation of the arid 
West. He was the foremost leader in the great struggle 
to coordinate all our social and governmental forces 
in the effort to secure the adoption of a rational and 
far-seeing policy for securing the conservation of all 
our national resources." 



CONSERVATION 291 

Roosevelt's great contributions to forest conserva- 
tion were two laws which could not have been passed 
except for his advocacy, the Forest Transfer Act of 
1905, and the Forest Homestead Act of 1906, beside a 
multitude of effective executive actions. 

It took nearly three years and a half to wring the 
Forest Transfer Act from Congress. In the meantime 
the President was not idle. The best and most accessible 
timber lands had already passed into private ownership; 
but very much remained. Pinchot's youngsters were 
turned loose in the mountains of the West. From 
the opening of spring until the winter snows barred 
them out they explored the ranges from Canada to 
the Mexican line. Singly and in small parties, with 
saddle horse, and pack train, they ran a race with 
the timber grabbers, sometimes neck and neck, the 
telegraphic orders for withdrawal occasionally beating 
the filings of the timbermen to the local land office by 
a narrow margin of minutes only. The work continued 
for two years after the adoption of the Transfer Act — 
Roosevelt issuing over a hundred and eighty forest 
reserve proclamations in the years 1905 to 1907, and over 
a hundred and ninety in the years 1907 to 1909. When 
a congressional "rider" stopped most of the work on 
March 4, 1907, the main prize was won. Thus to his 
vision, energy and courage the people of the United 
States owe their magnificent estate covering all the great 
mountain regions of the West, an estate equal in area to all 
the states touching the Atlantic from Maine to Virginia, in- 
clusive, with Vermont and West Virginia for good measure. 
By appointment of inter-departmental commissions 
to report on the organization of the scientific work of 
the government, on the business methods of the depart- 



292 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

ments, and on the administration of the public land 
laws — each commission suggested, organized, and 
directed by Pinchot — Roosevelt was able to report 
to Congress well thought-out recommendations con- 
cerning changes needed for producing greater executive 
efficiency, particularly the unifying of the government's 
forest work. When, on February 1, 1905, the Transfer 
Act became a law, the "Bureau of Forestry" was 
re-named "The Forest Service," to indicate its object 
and intent to serve the people in forest matters, and a 
little later the forest reserves were renamed "National 
Forests" in token that their resources of all kinds, 
instead of being kept away from the people, were opened 
for use and made ever more and more accessible, as 
Roosevelt so fully and continuously advocated. 

After the transfer of the national forest to the For- 
est Service their administration became efficient and 
complete. Reasonable charges were made for the use 
of any of their natural resources, wrongful cutting of 
national forest timber was detected, punished, and 
stopped, and fraudulent mineral entries made illegally 
to obtain valuable timber or water-power locations 
were prevented. In short, the national forests were 
managed for the public good, firmly, but good-naturedly. 
These activities were gall and wormwood to the great 
timber barons, to the sheep and cattle kings, and to the 
water-power corporations. Attacks lasting many days 
at a time were made on the Forester and the Forest 
Service each year when the appropriation bill came 
up in the Senate. For days at a time the battle would 
rage with few active on the side of conservation except 
some poorly prepared Senators held in the firing line 
by the influence of the President. 



CONSERVATION 293 

Roosevelt's desire to make the forests in every 
way available to the people for use is exemplified 
by his advocacy of the Forest Homestead Act which 
became a law in 1906. Under this act every spot and 
tract in the national forests that was suited to agri- 
culture was opened for home-making. This, coupled 
with the free gift of grazing and timber privileges to 
the extent of the domestic needs of the settlers in and 
near national forests, and the giving of preference in 
grazing rights to nearby residents — together with the 
courtesy and helpfulness of Forest Rangers to the ever- 
growing number of vacationists and health and pleasure 
seekers — won the hearts of the honest residents in and 
near the national forests, and set this great phase of 
conservation firmly and permanently on its feet. 

An amusing incident illustrates Roosevelt's use of 
his right and power as an executive to conserve the 
people's interest. In 1907 the foes of forestry in Congress 
put a rider on the appropriation bill for the Forest 
Service taking away the President's power to proclaim 
further national forests in the six States of Montana, 
Wyoming, Colorado, Idaho, Oregon and Washington. 
If Roosevelt vetoed the bill because of the rider, the 
activities not only of the Forest Service, but of the 
entire Agricultural Department would be at an end. 
If he signed the bill, millions of acres of mountain for- 
ests would be lost to the national forests and the 
people. However, after the harmful rider was accepted 
by the Senate, Roosevelt still had power to create 
national forests until the bill became a law by receiving 
his signature at any time up to noon of March 4th. 

Without any hesitation and with a joyfully clear 
conscience he signed proclamations creating sixteen 



294 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

million acres more of national forest land in the 
six states, on data supplied promptly by the Forest 
Service, before he tied his hands by signing the act. 
When the active opponents to forestry woke up to 
what had happened, they descended on Roosevelt in 
a body to express their anger at his action. But when 
they filed into his office and saw the good-humored 
twinkle in his unflinching eye, their spokesman, Senator 
Carter of Montana, could nurse his wrath no longer. 
He broke into a hearty laugh, joined in by all but one 
of the other Senators, and extending his hand cordialty 
said: "It isn't any use. We came to jump all over you, 
but can't say anything except that you put a good one 
over on us this time." 

The general mineral laws of the United States were 
and are almost hopeless, but Roosevelt did great things 
for conserving the coal land, the best of which was 
rapidly being gobbled up at nominal prices by great 
combinations or trusts, under the guise of the letter of 
the law, but often contrary to both its letter and spirit. 
Upon report of Pinchot's "Public Land Commission," 
Roosevelt caused some notable suits, both civil and 
criminal, to be instituted against large companies which 
had obtained coal land illegally. But this merely 
scratched the surface of the difficulty, and so, after 
obtaining favorable opinions from Woodruff and other 
law officers of the government, he withdrew from coal 
entry many million acres of coal lands on the public 
domain. 

This action and other similar withdrawals of oil 
lands and water-power sites caused more furore among 
certain big business interests than any other one thing 
that Roosevelt did. It was decried as illegal, but it is 



CONSERVATION 295 

noteworthy that it was long before any suit was ever 
brought to let the courts decide its legality. The business 
interests involved were so great that such suits would 
have been brought if there had been any hope of success. 
At last a withdrawal of oil lands was contested, and 
the President's action was upheld by the Supreme Court. 

Roosevelt's fairness is shown by the fact that he 
asked Congress to pass an act for leasing reasonably, 
but not unreasonably, large areas of the coal land to 
any one mining company or person. Congress adjourned 
without passing the leasing bill, and then Roosevelt 
had the coal land valued by the Geological Survey, 
and as fast as the price per acre in different sections 
was determined, he abrogated the withdrawal for the 
area thus valued and turned the land back to entry, 
so as not to interfere with legitimate mining enterprise. 

The conservation of water power for the public 
was another of Roosevelt's great achievements. The 
Forest Service, in its care of the national forests, soon 
came into conflict with big water-power corporations 
financed in New York, Boston and Philadelphia, but 
usually officered in their initial stages by western pro- 
moters. The mountain snows and springs gave streams. 
The slopes gave fall. The promoters and bankers wanted 
to buy exclusive and perpetual ownership of both at 
a nominal price. The law authorized the government 
to grant only revocable permits and seemed to give 
power to impose conditions in them. The Forest Serv- 
ice drafted legislation to authorize fifty-year leases on 
conditions to be agreed upon with the lessees. In the 
mean time the Service imposed the conditions, including a 
small rental charge on the permits as each was issued. 

Certain corporations raised the usual cry of illegality 



296 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

and appealed to the Attorney-General. He decided 
against them. Instead of going to the courts they 
appealed to Congress. Their Boston lawyers drafted 
a bill granting the water-power sites outright to the 
first applicant at a nominal price. It was introduced 
in the Senate by Senator Crane of Massachusetts, in 
the House by Mr. Mondell of Wyoming. Many other 
bills of like effect were introduced. It seemed that 
the Forest Service policy was to be swept away. Roose- 
velt intervened. In a message transmitting the report 
of the Inland Waterways Commission, he exposed the 
true character of these bills. That killed them. 

From that day to this the great power corporations 
have blocked all water-power leasing bills, but leasing 
has nevertheless gone on under the old revocable permits 
until water-power development in the mountain and 
Pacific states has exceeded in intensity that in all other 
parts of the country. Years after he began it, the legal- 
ity of Roosevelt's permit system came before the 
Supreme Court and was upheld. 

Besides the mountain streams, another great source 
of water power is the navigable rivers of the country. 
A dam may often improve the navigation of a river, 
while developing water power. All matters of naviga- 
tion and related river improvement fall within Federal 
control. The conservationists had known the close 
relation between forests and stream flow. They came 
to see each river system of the country as a unit, and 
all of them as capable of improvement under a single 
comprehensive plan. Pinchot proposed to Roosevelt 
an investigation to formulate a sound waterways policy, 
and in the spring of 1907 an executive order created 
the Inland Waterways Commission. 



CONSERVATION 297 

The Inland Waterways Commission, seeing the inter- 
relation of waters and other natural resources, advised 
Roosevelt to call a conference of all the state governors and 
of numerous other delegates to discuss the conservation 
of natural resources in all its aspects. He did so at once. 
The conference was held at the White House in May, 
1908. At this conference the conservation movement 
as a complete whole came before the country. The 
conference recommended that the President create a 
Conservation Commission to take stock of all natural 
resources, and of the rate of their exhaustion and waste. 
This was done by executive order. The Commission 
was made up of department officials and members 
of Congress. The experts, resources, and information of 
all departments were put at its disposal. Its report, 
transmitted to Congress in December, 1908, was the 
first inventory of natural resources ever taken by any 
nation and attracted world-wide attention. The report 
advised a National Conservation Conference to discuss 
its recommendations. This was held in Washington 
in February, 1909. Roosevelt supported it and spoke. 

One more notable gathering — the North American 
Conservation Conference, made up of delegates from 
the United States, Canada and Mexico, was called by 
Roosevelt and held during his administration. From it 
the vigorous conservation movement of Canada had its 
birth. 

The charge of lawlessness so often brought against 
Roosevelt's acts in the Presidency may be tested by 
his conservation measures. His opponents declared 
nearly eveiy one of them "unconstitutional" and "with- 
out authority of law." The language of invective was 
exhausted upon them. He had, they said, trodden under 



298 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

foot the constitutional rights of the states and the 
prerogatives of Congress. The Reclamation Act was 
unconstitutional; the permanent reservation and admin- 
istration of national forests within a state reduced 
the state to vassalage; the forest regulations were an 
attempt to promulgate laws by executive decree; the 
withdrawal orders revived the claim of the Stuarts 
to the suspensory power. 

He was a new Charles I and Cromwell in one. His 
water-power program robbed the Western states of 
their property in, and the Eastern states of their juris- 
diction over, water, etc. So ran the criticism of 
Senators in the annual debates over the Forest Service 
appropriation. Ten years have passed. These matters 
at last have come before the Supreme Court in six great 
cases. It is well to recite them. 

In Baker vs. Swigart, the court assumed the consti- 
tutionality of the Reclamation Act and upheld the 
authority of the government to collect from users of 
water the annual operation and maintenance charges 
fixed by the Secretary of the Interior. In Light vs. 
United States, the court upheld the right of the nation 
permanently to hold and administer national forests 
or other reservations within a state and declared that 
this left the state on a footing of equality with all the 
other states. It further held that state laws limiting 
the rights of landed proprietors are void as to leased 
lands owned by the United States. In United States 
vs. Grimand, the court held that the forest regulations 
governing grazing were not a usurpation of legislative 
power but were valid, and that violation of them was 
punishable in the Federal courts by fine and imprison- 
ment. 







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CONSERVATION 299 

In United States vs. Midwest Oil Company, the 
court held that the withdrawal of public lands from dis- 
posal under existing laws, done for the purpose of giving 
Congress an opportunity to consider proposals of new 
and different laws, is not an exercise of suspensory power, 
and is valid. In United States vs. Chandler Dunbar 
Company, the court decided that Congress as an incident 
to improving the navigation of a river may take the raw 
water power of the stream, develop it, and sell or lease 
the surplus over that needed to operate the navigation 
works, all without compensation to the riparian owner; 
that any right of the owner under the state law to the 
flow of the stream for power or to the bed is void as 
against the Federal right of navigation, with all its inci- 
dents. In Utah Power and Light Company vs. United 
States, the court held that the water-power regulations 
of the Forest Service are valid, including the exaction 
of a rental for water-power sites. 

With one exception all these decisions were unani- 
mous. The Supreme Court has upheld every single action 
of Roosevelt for conservation that has been brought 
before it. Thanks to his courage and wisdom, construc- 
tive reformers need not fear that the constitution and 
the laws will bind the hands of a brave executive advised 
by skilled counsel. 

One thing more should be said: That the Roosevelt 
conservation policies are today as sound as they were 
when they were first advanced. The passage of time 
has merely served to confirm their wisdom, and the 
foresighted statesmanship of the man who gave them 
to the nation and the world. 

Roosevelt's Presidency made the conservation 
movement possible. He connected the vision of a better 



300 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

day with the commonplace of fact. Never again will 
we return to the old wasteful conditions, under which 
the nation's resources were recklessly exploited to satisfy 
private greed. This much we have gained, even though 
no one in high place has arisen with the courage and the 
vision necessary to carry on his work. Who can bend 
the bow of Ulysses? 



CHAPTER XX 

Through the Heart of Africa 

ROOSEVELT'S seven and a half years of service as 
President ended on March 4, 1909. In the 
' morning of that day Washington awoke to a 
tremendous snow storm. The President and the Presi- 
dent-elect, William H. Taft, met at the breakfast table 
and Roosevelt, surveying the storm, remarked, "I knew 
there would be a blizzard clear up to the minute I went 
out of office." After the inauguration ceremonies he 
and Mrs. Roosevelt drove to the Union Station. There 
an enormous crowd was gathered to see him off and as 
he boarded his train the shout of "Good-bye Teddy" 
rose from thousands of throats. Three weeks later he 
was outward bound for Africa. 

For some time he had planned this trip to collect 
animal and plant specimens for the Smithsonian Insti- 
tution — the great National Museum at Washington. 
The party which sailed from New York on March 23d 
consisted of Colonel Roosevelt, his son Kermit, and 
three naturalists, Lieutenant-Colonel Edgar A. Mearns, 
Mr. Edmund Heller and Mr. J. Alden Loring. At 
Naples they transshipped to an East African liner. 
On this vessel they met Frederick Courteney Selous, 
a famous English big-game hunter, who had helped 
largely in the preparations for the trip. Selous had 
been a mighty huntsman for nearly forty years, and 
his tales of adventures in the heart of Africa were a 
fit preparation for the experiences which Roosevelt 
and his friends were soon to enjoy. 

(301) 



302 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

From Naples their vessel carried them eastward 
on the Mediterranean, through the Suez Canal to the 
Red Sea, and down he east coast of Africa, until at 
last, on April 21st, they reached the port of Mombasa, 
just below the equator, in British East Africa. There 
they were warmly welcomed by Lieutenant-Governor 
Jackson, whose considerable attainments as a naturalist 
gave him a particular interest in the expedition. Next 
day they boarded the Lieutenant-Governor's special 
train to make the journey inland on the Uganda Rail- 
road. With them went also R. J. Cuninghame and 
Leslie Tarlton, both hunters of long experience. 

The railroad led through the Southern Game 
Reserve — a country which abounded in all manner of 
wild life. It had been built not many years before 
through a country infested by man-eating lions, who 
had very seriously interfered with the work of construc- 
tion, and who were still plentiful enough to cause trou- 
ble. The Colonel and his party sat on a comfortable 
seat built above the cow-catcher, and from this point 
of vantage enjoyed the hundreds of animals which 
they met. There were herds of hartebeests, enormous 
ostriches, zebras, monkeys, giraffes, and birds innum- 
erable. The animals were so tame that the train dis- 
turbed them very little. Not long before, a lioness 
had actually stayed on the track so long that she was 
run over and killed. The night of the Colonel's trip 
giraffes put the telegraph service out of commission 
by knocking down some of the wires and a pole as they 
crossed the track. The whole country was a wonder- 
world for the naturalist. 

After three or four hundred miles of this travel the 
party at last reached the station of Kapiti Plains, where 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 303 

their caravan was waiting for them. The preparations 
for the expedition were prodigious. 1\! was necessary to 
carry enormous quantities of natir 'ist's supplies includ- 
ing, among other things, four tons of salt for curing 
skins, hundreds of traps, and many boxes of ammuni- 
tion. Two hundred porters were engaged to carry these 
materials, as well as the tents, food and personal equip- 
ment. There were gun-bearers, tent boys, horse boys, 
and fifteen native soldiers to keep order in the outfit. 

The camp looked as if it were prepared for a small 
army. The Colonel's tent was in the front with a large 
American flag over it, flanked by the tents of the other 
members of his party. Behind were the tents of the 
native soldiers and servants. The Colonel had a fly 
over his tent to protect it from the intense heat, a rear 
extension for bathing, and a canvas floor to keep out 
ticks, jiggers and scorpions. All this was necessary 
in Africa, but must have seemed luxurious to a man 
accustomed to camping in the North Woods and in 
the Rockies. 

For the first two weeks the party were the guests 
of Sir Alfred Pease, who owned a large farm near the 
Kapiti Plains. It was Sir Alfred who really introduced 
them to African hunting. Each day they would start 
out bent upon securing certain specimens for the 
National Museum. In all the hunting there was no 
useless slaughter; nothing was shot except for scientific 
purposes and for the food of the caravan. In speaking 
of this afterward, Colonel Roosevelt said, "Kermit 
and I kept about a dozen trophies for ourselves; other- 
wise we shot nothing that was not used either as a museum 
specimen or for meat — usually for both purposes. We 
were in hunting grounds practically as good as any 



304 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

that have ever existed; but we did not kill a tenth, 
not a hundredth, part of what we might have killed 
had we been willing. The mere size of the bag indicates 
little as to a man's prowess as a hunter, and almost 
nothing as to the interest or value of his achievement." 
The dangerous game animals of Africa are the lion, 
the buffalo, the elephant, the rhinoceros and the leopard. 
Authorities differ as to the comparative danger of hunt- 
ing these beasts. All of them are fierce and easily able 
to kill a man. The Colonel's first exciting experience 
on the trip was a lion hunt with Sir Alfred Pease. At 
the end of a long day, in which three lions had already 
been killed, the Colonel and his party stirred up a fourth 
lion and galloped across the plain in pursuit of him. 
They gained on the lion rapidly and he suddenly halted 
and stood at bay in a patch of long grass. Roosevelt 
dismounted about a hundred and fifty yards from the 
beast and was joined by Simba, his horse boy. The 
lion, lashing his tail and roaring with rage, stood facing 
the Colonel and apparently ready to charge. It does 
not take an angry lion long to cover a hundred and 
fifty yards, and the Colonel made up his mind that in 
case of trouble he would trust to his rifle rather than 
to the speed of his horse. But before the lion had made 
up his mind to rush, three bullets from Roosevelt's 
rifle had put an end to his career. 

The four lions were then skinned, and, under che 
rising moon, the party set off for the farm. As they 
trudged along carrying the skins the natives chanted 
antiphonal songs of triumph, expressing the delight 
which the death of a lion always caused them. It was 
a weird and beautiful scene which Roosevelt remem- 
bered with delight. 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 305 

At last the time came for them to bid farewell to 
their hospitable host and hostess and to start out across 
the Athi Plains. The march now began in earnest. 
Each day camp was broken as early as possible and the 
porters shouldered their loads. The American flag 
which flew over the Colonel's tent was always carried 
near the head of the procession, and behind it followed 
the long line of burden-bearers. As they marched they 
often chanted monotonously, or repeated in unison 
over and over again a word or phrase which frequently 
was meaningless, but whose rhythm pleased them. 
On a long march there was always a halt for lunch. 
At the end of the day's journey the tents were quickly 
pitched, with broad streets between the rows, and as 
night fell a camp-fire was kindled, about which the 
Colonel and his friends sat and discussed their recent 
adventures. When a good hunting country was reached 
a permanent camp was set up, from which excursions 
were made during the day. 

After they left Sir Alfred's ranch came the first 
experience with buffalo. The African buffalo is an 
enormous, powerful creature, something like our Ameri- 
can bison, but with very much larger horns. One day 
the hunting party were creeping up the bed of a diy 
water-course, on the lookout for game, when Cuning- 
hame detected half a dozen buffalo lying in the grass. 
The hunters crawled cautiously to within two hundred 
yards of the animals and from that distance fired. At 
the noise of the shots there sprang from the grass, to 
their consternation, a herd of seventy or eighty. Had 
the herd charged, probably no one would have been left 
to tell the tale. Fortunately, however, the buffalo 
turned at right angles and made off at a run. But in a 

20 



306 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

few seconds they stopped and, forming a quarter-circle, 
faced the hunters with outstretched heads. There was 
nothing to do but to stand steady and to refrain from 
shooting. To run or to fire would have been to court 
death. The herd hesitated a minute and then resumed 
its flight. The first shots had hit three of the animals, 
and these were secured as specimens. 

After five weeks the party reached the busy town of 
Nairobi, some distance up the Uganda Railroad from 
the place where their trip had begun. From Nairobi 
thousands of specimens of beasts, birds, and plants 
were prepared and shipped to the Smithsonian. 

The next trip was south from the railroad, into the 
almost waterless Sotik district. This country abounded 
with birds of all kinds, and with game as well. The 
hunters secured specimens of the rhinoceros, topi, giraffe, 
hyena and of many other animals. In this country 
there were plenty of lions, and one of these gave the 
Colonel a thrilling adventure. 

On a tremendously hot day, as the hunters were cross- 
ing the plain, one of the natives, looking over a little 
rise, descried a big lion with a yellow-and-black mane 
walking in the open toward the body of a zebra which 
he had killed the night before. Immediately the party 
started after him on horseback and pursued him for 
some distance. The lion lay down behind a bush, and 
the Colonel, jumping from his horse, made a poor shot 
which only wounded the beast slightly. On he went 
and lay down again behind a low grassy ant-hill. At a 
distance of two hundred yards Roosevelt and Tarlton 
dismounted and prepared to fire again. Tarlton shot 
first but his rifle was badly sighted and he missed entirely. 
Then the Colonel fired, but he had misjudged the 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 307 

distance and again he inflicted only a slight flesh wound. 
The lion was grunting savagely and lashing his tail, 
and as the bullet struck him he started for the two men 
with the speed of a greyhound. Tarlton fired and missed 
again. The Colonel, steadying his rifle on his knee, drew 
a bead on the center of the great beast's chest, and as 
the lion galloped at him, grunting with rage, pressed the 
trigger and the bullet sped to its mark. The lion col- 
lapsed in a heap but recovered himself and attempted 
to charge again, but the shot had been fatal and in a few 
seconds he was dead. 

It was in this country, too, that they hunted the 
hippopotamus. The hippo can make fair speed on land 
or in deep water, but his real home is shallow water 
where he can gallop very fast. As the party were steam- 
ing along the edge of Lake Naivasha, they saw a big 
hippo walking on the shore of a little bay. The Colonel, 
with Cuninghame and Kermit, got into a rowboat 
and when they were about a hundred yards away from 
the hippo, the Colonel fired into its shoulder. Imme- 
diately the huge beast spun around, plunged into the water 
and with its enormous jaws wide open, came straight 
through the shallow water at the boat. As it came on 
the Colonel fired again and again, and Kermit took 
successive photographs, without even looking up from 
the finder of his camera. Before the hippo reached the 
boat, one of the Colonel's shots had killed him and he 
fell into the shallow water, from which it was a tremen- 
dous job to pull him out. 

On July 24th they reached Nairobi again and shipped 
home another lot of specimens. This done, they started 
northward on a trip into the foothills of Mt. Kenia, a 
tremendous snow-clad peak surrounded by glaciers, 



308 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

which towers more than 18,000 feet above sea-level. 
In this country they hunted elephants for the first time. 
The African elephant is a highly intelligent animal 
but he has never been tamed as has his Indian cousin. 
Indeed, an Indian elephant which had been trained to 
man's use was the astonishment of the natives at 
Entebbe, on the shores of Lake Victoria Nyanza. The 
African elephant has very keen hearing and scent, and 
is for that reason extremely difficult to hunt. Roosevelt 
and his party, however, were indefatigable and were 
blessed with the good luck which accompanies perse- 
verance. 

After some difficulty, they found and followed the 
tracks of a small herd and finally could hear the 
elephants moving slowly through the jungle. The 
foliage was so dense that for half an hour they crept 
along within a few rods of the herd, hearing them dis- 
tinctly but unable to see them. At last an opening in 
the trail revealed a big bull resting his heavy tusks on 
the branches of a young tree. Roosevelt fired, striking 
the animal's head, but missing the brain. The mighty 
beast fell, but in the same instant the bushes parted 
on one side and through them rushed another bull 
elephant, charging so close that he could have touched 
the Colonel with his trunk. Cuninghame hastily fired but 
the elephant, with a shrill trumpet, disappeared into 
the jungle. The naturalists then turned to the work 
of skinning the dead elephant — a formidable task, 
which took many days to accomplish. 

On October first the party were back again at Nai- 
robi to ship more specimens, and five days later they 
started from the railroad station of Londiani, not far 
from Lake Victoria Nyanza, for another northward 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 309 

trip in the region of Mt. Elgon. This country was known 
as the Uasin Gishu Plateau, and contained several 
kinds of antelope and a five-horned giraffe, of which 
specimens were wanted for the Museum. Here they 
saw for the first time the honey-birds, whom John Bur- 
roughs had specially charged Roosevelt to observe. 
A honey-bird often approached the party, chattering 
loudly, and when followed would lead the way to a 
tree which was always found to contain honey. 
Sometimes the honeycomb had grubs in it, which 
were apparently the reward that the bird wanted for 
its services. 

Near Sergoi Lake in this country, the Colonel and 
his party joined a unique kind of lion hunt. With a 
number of resident Englishmen and a group of sixty 
or seventy native warriors, they started out one morning 
to search for the lion. Beating through a wide, shallow 
valley about noon, they at last discovered one who 
galloped off through the high grass, pursued by the 
huntsmen. After a mile's chase he stood at bay under 
a low thorn tree and was quickly surrounded by the 
natives, each armed with a spear and a shield. The 
lion with bristling mane and lashing tail, faced first one 
way and then the other, roaring with fury. Suddenly 
he charged at a point in the circle. The leading war- 
rior sprang to the front and hurled his spear. As it 
entered the lion's body the great beast flung himself 
on the man nearest him and disregarding his adversary's 
spear, which had pierced him from one side to the other, 
struck the man's shield down and leaped upon his vic- 
tim. In an instant a dozen spears were through his 
body and he fell in the agony of death, gripping a spear- 
head in his jaws with such force as to bend it double. 



310 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

The wounded man soon forgot his pain when the Colonel 
promised him a heifer; while the other warriors, 
with their shields above their heads, performed a dance 
of victory around the lion's dead body. 

When they had completed their trip in the Uasin 
Gishu Plateau, the party returned to Nairobi, and from 
there, after a few necessary preparations, started, on 
December 18th, for Lake Victoria Nyanza. Among 
these preparations were some additions to the Colonel's 
famous Pigskin Library — a considerable collection of 
books carried in a light aluminum and oil-cloth case, 
and ranging all the way from Euripides to Alice in 
Wonderland. 

The railroad trip to Lake Victoria Nyanza was brief, 
and twenty -four hours in a lake steamer carried them 
across to Entebbe, the seat of the English Governor 
of Uganda. On the voyage they passed many beautiful 
deserted islands which had once been thickly populated 
before the country had been ravaged by the fatal sleep- 
ing sickness. From Entebbe they went on to Campalla, 
where the Colonel met the little native King of Uganda, 
and paid interesting visits to the Church of England 
and Roman Catholic missions. In the latter Mother 
Paul, an old friend of the Colonel, taught the native 
children, and they delighted him by an extraordinary 
rendering of the Star Spangled Banner. 

From Victoria Nyanza, the road led a hundred and 
sixty miles to Lake Albert Nyanza. On the way the 
hunters were frequently greeted by tribal chiefs bringing 
presents of fruit, sometimes accompanied by sheep 
or a bullock. There were elephants in this country 
and the Colonel secured a splendid specimen before 
they had gone far on the road. 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 311 

From Albert Nyanza a boat carried them past the 
mouth of the Victorian Nile, which was alive with huge 
crocodiles, and into the White Nile, down which they 
rapidly steamed. Forty-eight hours later they disem- 
barked in a burning hot country known as the "Lado," 
in which mosquitoes were unpleasantly plentiful. Here 
they secured specimens of the square-nosed rhinoceros, 
whose head is quite different from that of the black 
rhinoceros which they had already seen. Kermit took 
many photographs in this region as, indeed, he did 
throughout the whole trip, spending much time and 
pains to procure pictures of live animals in their natu- 
ral state. 

From the Lado they started on the march for Gondo- 
koro, where the long tramp was to end. There they 
arrived on February 26, 1910, and were met by enthu- 
siastic natives who carried a large American flag and 
treated them to a rendering of "America" by a native 
band. Here they were also greeted by M. Ranquet, 
the Belgian Commandant of the Lado district. Sir 
Reginald Wingate, Sirdar of the Soudan, had sent a 
boat to bring the party down the Nile. As they went 
along the 1300-mile stretch to Khartoum, they landed 
at intervals to complete their collections of specimens. 
Finally, they reached Khartoum on March 14th and 
were met by the Sirdar and other British officials with a 
hearty welcome. What pleased the Colonel and Kermit 
even more, was that Mrs. Roosevelt and Ethel came 
up from Cairo by train and joined them there. 

The eleven-months' trip had been a great success 
from the scientific point of view. Four thousand speci- 
mens of birds and nearly five thousand of mammals had 
been secured for the Smithsonian Institution, and in 



312 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

addition, about twenty-five hundred fish, reptiles and 
batrachians. Many invertebrates had also been col- 
lected, several thousand plants and a quantity of 
anthropological material. These achievements were due 
not only to the skill and perseverance of the hunters, 
but also in no small degree to the constant and helpful 
kindness of the British and Belgian officials and settlers 
through whose country they had passed. 

From Khartoum, the Roosevelts visited Omdurman 
and other battlefields on which the Mahdi's power 
was broken years ago, and then went by rail to Cairo. 
At Cairo University, on March 28th, Roosevelt delivered 
a lecture to the Egyptian students, in which he deplored 
the recent assassination of Premier Boutros, and forcibly 
reminded his hearers that a community cannot exercise 
the right of self-government until it has shown the 
power of self-restraint. 

They sailed from Cairo to Italy and began there a 
ten-weeks' trip through Europe. Throughout his journey 
Roosevelt received the most remarkable evidences of 
his world-wide popularity — real tributes to his personal 
qualities, for he did not come as the official representa- 
tive of the United States but simply as a private citizen. 
In Rome he was entertained by the King and Queen 
of Italy. He had asked Ambassador Leishman to get 
for him an audience with the Pope, but the interview 
had proved impossible to arrange because the Vatican 
had insisted upon attaching a condition that the Colo- 
nel should refrain from visiting the American Methodist 
Mission in Rome. Roosevelt would have enjoyed a 
talk with the Holy Father, but he was not willing to 
restrict his freedom of speech and action as he was asked 
to do. 




Photo by Paul Thompson, N. Y. 

AT THE UNIVERSITY OF BERLIN 

An incident of the trip through Europe in 1910. He is seen leaving the Uni- 
versity with Dr. Hill, the American Ambassador, after delivering an address and 
receiving the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 




Photo by Paul Thompson, N. Y. 

AT THE TOMB OF NAPOLEON 

During the triumphal progress through Europe which followed his African 
hunting trip, Colonel Roosevelt delivered a number of notable addresses. It was 
after the Sorbonne address that he visited the Hotel des Invalides, where he was 
received by the Military Governor of Paris, General Dalstein. 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 313 

From Rome he went to Vienna, where he was the 
guest of Emperor Francis Joseph, and to Budapest, 
where Archduke Joseph entertained him, and where 
he met Francis Kossuth, son of the famous Hungarian 
patriot who visited America just before the Civil War. 

In Paris, on April 23d, he delivered an address on 
Citizenship in a Republic, at the Sorbonne before a 
large and representative body of French scholars and 
other notables. From France he went through Belgium, 
Holland and Denmark to Norway. At Christiania he 
spoke on the subject of International Peace before the 
Nobel Prize Committee, from whom he had received 
the Peace Prize for his promotion of the Russo-Japanese 
Treaty. At the conclusion of the address the King and 
Queen stood and joined with the rest of the audience 
in a Norwegian "three times three for Theodore Roose- 
velt." He received the degree of Doctor of Philosophy 
from the University of Norway, an honor which that 
institution had hitherto bestowed only upon its own 
students. A great dinner was given in his honor by 
King Haakon. But of all his Norwegian experiences I 
imagine that he enjoyed most his talk with Nansen, the 
Arctic explorer, with whom he was able to exchange 
tales of adventure and daring. 

At Potsdam he was the guest of the Kaiser and on 
May 11th they reviewed together twelve thousand 
German troops. At the conclusion of the review, the 
Kaiser turned to him and said: "My friend Roosevelt, 
I am glad to welcome you, the most distinguished Amer- 
ican citizen. You are the first civilian who has ever 
reviewed German troops." If either of them remembered 
the Venezuela incident of eight years before, we may 
be sure that it was not mentioned between them. 



314 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Next day he delivered a lecture on The World Move- 
ment before the University of Berlin. The lecture was 
attended by the royal family as well as by the diplomatic 
representatives and the faculty and students of the 
institution, and after it was over he received from the 
University the honorary degree of Doctor of Philosophy. 

The Colonel reached London on May 16th as the 
special representative of the United States, to attend 
the funeral of King Edward. The King was buried 
on the 20th with great pomp and circumstance, and the 
ceremony was attended by many of the crowned heads 
of Europe and by the representatives of other nations. 

Roosevelt had a keen sense of humor and was never 
more entertaining than when he could be induced to 
recount some of his experiences on this occasion. The 
numerous questions of etiquette which arose between 
the various persons brought together afforded many 
amusing situations. At one of these recitals some mem- 
bers of the Outlook staff and a few others, including 
Miss Jane Addams of Chicago, were assembled in a 
very small room. As the chairs were few, most of the 
company, including Miss Addams, were perched on 
various boxes which were arranged around the wall, 
and Miss Addams, at an inimitable recital of a partic- 
ularly absurd incident, laughed so hard that she actually 
tumbled off the box on which she was seated. 

It is manifest that many of these stories cannot 
now be told. There is, however, no reason why two in 
connection with the German Emperor cannot be 
repeated. At a luncheon — I believe at Windsor Castle — 
given to the crowned heads and to the delegates from 
the principal nations, the Czar of Russia was talking to 
Roosevelt. The Emperor walked over to them and 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 315 

without apology brusquely interrupted the conversation 
by saying: "My friend Roosevelt, I wish you to meet 
the King of Spain. He!" (turning his back directly 
upon the Czar, but looking at him over his shoulder with 
a most contemptuous expression) "is a king worth 
knowing." 

Speaking of the Kaiser, another story which I have 
often heard repeated, but not by Roosevelt, is to the 
effect that the Kaiser said to him that he was anxious 
to have some conversation with him, and ascertaining 
from some one in attendance what his engagements 
were the next day, he continued, "I can see you at 
2:30 and can give you three-quarters of an hour." 
As quick as a flash Roosevelt replied, "I shall be very 
glad to call on you tomorrow at 2:30 but I will not 
be able to stay longer than a half hour." As a matter 
of fact he had an engagement at 2:30 to call on the 
authoress, Mrs Humphrey Ward. 

This is perhaps the place to relate one other story 
in which the Kaiser figures. On his return home the 
Kaiser sent Roosevelt pictures taken during his visit 
to Berlin, showing the two men reviewing the German 
troops. From time to time there was more or less corre- 
spondence between them. On the outbreak of the war 
in Europe, when the action of Germany in Belgium 
was being properly subjected to strong condemnation 
in this country, a prominent German-American called 
at Oyster Bay. He delicately pointed out to Roosevelt 
that the Kaiser, during his stay in Germany, had shown 
him honors which had never before been accorded to a 
private citizen, and that he had since corresponded 
with him and had in other ways given evidence of his 
distinguished consideration. Now was Roosevelt's 



316 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

opportunity to show that he appreciated these attentions 
by making some statement to counteract the criticisms 
which were being directed against the Kaiser and the 
German nation. Roosevelt often expressed the satis- 
faction with which he replied — and we can see his eyes 
flash: "What you say in regard to the courtesies which 
have been shown me by the German Emperor is entirely 
true. It is also true that I have corresponded with him 
since my return to this country. Indeed, Sir, my rela- 
tions with the Kaiser have been exactly the same as 
with the King of the Belgians. Good-afternoon." 

Questions of precedence arose at King Edward's 
funeral and the heart-burnings were many. There was 
one representative who seemed to feel very deeply the 
fact that there were slight but perceptible differences 
between the treatment accorded to him and that accorded 
to certain other delegates. He came to Roosevelt one 
morning in great excitement at the indignity which 
he had suffered through the fact that the attendants 
who had been assigned to him were not dressed in new 
liveries every day. He had ascertained that those 
appointed to attend Mr. Roosevelt were also lacking 
in new raiment. As the delegate did not speak English 
but did understand French, Roosevelt made the mistake 
of trying to joke in French. While fluent in that lan- 
guage, his accent, as he himself said, was that of the 
French picked up at Stratford-atte-Bowe. To smooth 
the injured feelings of his friend, he assured him that 
it did not make any difference to him whether his attend- 
ants retained their present costumes or were dressed 
in yellow trousers and green coats. "That is your offi- 
cial livery," exclaimed the excitable foreigner. "I will 
go at once and demand that all your attendants be 



THROUGH THE HEART OF AFRICA 317 

dressed as you desire." And it was with the greatest 
difficulty that Roosevelt restrained him from putting 
his polite intentions into effect. 

On June 1st the Colonel was given the freedom of 
the City of London at the Guildhall, and proceeded 
immediately to exercise that freedom by a character- 
istically frank speech. He heartily praised British rule 
in East Africa, Uganda and the Soudan, where his 
recent trip had given him the opportunity of extensive 
observation. He pointed, as a contrast, to the prevalence 
of crime and disorder in Egypt and expressed his regret 
that the British did not extend to that country the 
excellent system employed in their other possessions. 
This speech created a considerable stir both in this 
country and in Great Britain. Roosevelt was accused 
of a failure to regard the feelings of his hosts. But the 
excitement was really confined largely to his enemies 
in America. In Great Britain his words were generally 
accepted as the criticism of a sincere friend whom 
everybody expected to speak frankly. As a matter of 
fact, the speech had been submitted to Earl Grey before 
it was delivered. 

A few days later he delivered a carefully prepared 
and highly interesting lecture at Oxford University 
on Biological Analogies in History. Then came the time 
to turn his face toward the west and home. The family 
embarked on the Hamburg-American steamer Kaiserin- 
Auguste-Victoria amid the farewells of their British 
friends, and after an uneventful voyage finally reached 
New York on June 18th. 

There a tremendous and unprecedented welcome 
awaited the Colonel, a welcome such as had never before 
in our history been accorded to a private citizen. As 



318 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

his vessel passed through the Narrows she was greeted 
with the presidential salute of twenty-one guns from 
Fort Wadsworth, and received the same greeting from 
the battleship South Carolina. As he came to anchor 
off Quarantine, Roosevelt was met by a reception com- 
mittee composed of three hundred citizens of New 
York, and by a special greeting conveyed to him from 
President Taft by two members of the Cabinet. The 
party boarded the revenue-cutter Androscoggin, and 
in a long line, with warships, tugs and excursion boats 
innumerable, steamed up the bay to the Battery. 

There a prodigious crowd had assembled, and every 
available inch of space in the specially-constructed 
grandstand and on the street, and at the windows, and on 
the roofs of the houses was occupied. The Colonel landed 
and walked directly to a platform which had been 
erected for the purpose. Mayor Gaynor welcomed him in 
a brief and happy address, to which the Colonel answered : 
"I have thoroughly enjoyed myself; and now I am more 
glad than I can say to get home, to be back in my own 
country, back among people I love. And I am ready 
and eager to do my part so far as I am able, in helping 
solve problems which must be solved, if we, of this, the 
greatest democratic republic upon which the sun has 
ever shone, are to see its destinies rise to the high level 
of our hopes and its opportunities." 

From the Battery he rode uptown, along Broadway 
and Fifth Avenue, with an escort of his own Rough 
Riders and of two thousand Spanish War Veterans. 
An enormous crowd lined the sidewalks and welcomed 
him home with joy. It was an inspiring home-coming 
and presaged the success of his leadership in the great 
struggle which was to come. 



CHAPTER XXI 

The Beginning of the Progressive Movement 

ROOSEVELT was a Republican because he 
believed in a liberal interpretation and vig- 
"" orous exercise of the powers of the Federal 
Government. Before and during the Civil War the 
Republican party was at once a federal and a radical 
party. Lincoln embodied both these elements. He 
was by intellectual conviction a Federalist, and his 
moral instinct was to right wrong by positive action. 
The Republicans, as a national party, included the 
great majority of the business men of the country, 
while its opposition to slavery and the toryism which 
was the natural outgrowth of that institution attracted 
to it at the outset and held throughout the Civil War 
the majority of the reformers, practical and sentimental. 
From the end of the war and the death of Lincoln the 
business elements of the party secured and thereafter 
maintained complete control. This was natural. Mate- 
rial prosperity was the prime need of the nation. The 
idea of the people as a whole uniting through the 
instrumentality of the government to carry on a con- 
structive policy to insure national prosperity by pro- 
moting better industrial conditions and a more equitable 
distribution of wealth, was foreign to current political 
and economic thought. Progress through individual 
initiative was the only method of progress thought of. 
The terms "successful business man" and "good 
citizen" were regarded as synonymous. The idea that 

(319) 



320 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the government best advanced the interests of all by 
enabling the business man to make as much money 
as possible was universally accepted as a political axiom, 
and therefore the only constructive measure ever con- 
sidered to promote the public welfare was a protective 
tariff. 

Thus, in 1880, when Roosevelt left college, the 
Republican party, while still a national or federal party, 
had become the conservative party of the nation. Had 
not the Democratic party clung to its States' Rights 
ideals, the young college graduate, like so many of 
his associates, would have become a Democrat, if not 
at once, then certainly in 1884 on the nomination of 
Blaine. But Roosevelt was then, as throughout his life, 
a Federalist. To him a party which clung to what he 
regarded as the fetish of States' Rights was not an 
instrument which could be trusted to promote the 
progress of the nation. He therefore became a Repub- 
lican because he believed that that party was alone 
competent to meet effectively the needs of the country. 

The attitude of the Democratic party under the 
leadership of Bryan in 1896 towards the question of 
free silver served to strengthen him in this conviction. 
Though by temperament the very antithesis of a stand- 
patter, and though his instinct was to seek Out evils 
in the existing order and meet them by positive action, 
yet he was as far removed as possible from that type 
of social reformer who is attracted to any project the 
immediate effect of which is to benefit the man who 
has not at the expense of the man who has. To him 
the maintenance of what he regarded as an honest 
currency was a moral question and as a reformer he was 
as much opposed to free silver in 1896, as he was 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 321 

opposed as a Federalist in 1900 to the Democratic 
attitude on the Philippines and other questions arising 
out of the Spanish War. 

Thus it was that the tragedy at Buffalo placed in 
the great office of President a man of unbounded energy, 
ability and courage who, as a strong Federalist, was 
in entire agreement with the leaders of his party in and 
out of Congress on many subjects, but who differed 
radically from them on the many questions arising 
out of our phenomenal industrial development. They 
were conservative. He was progressive. They looked 
at any measure tending to curtail the complete freedom 
of men who were carrying on large business enterprises 
as dangerous and radical. His instinct led him to regard 
the Federal Government as the instrument through 
which the evils of the new industrial combinations 
alone could be controlled. They, shrinking from this 
consequence of that federalism which had made their 
fathers Republicans, began to express their fear of 
"unconstitutional extension of Federal power." He, 
regarding himself as the steward of the whole people, 
desired to preserve for the benefit of all, the natural 
resources of the nation. They, regarding the promotion 
of private business as the sole end of government, were 
willing that these resources should be absorbed by 
private interests. 

Thus, on many subjects, especially the larger ques- 
tions of foreign and colonial policy, Roosevelt found 
himself in almost complete accord with the conservative 
Republican leaders in Congress, men like Aldrich and 
Hale in the Senate, and Cannon and Hawley in the 
House. On the other hand, he found himself in direct 
variance with them on almost all questions of domestic 
21 



322 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

policy. Each side, probably honestly, tried to get on 
with the other. Certainly there was an honest trial 
on Roosevelt's part. Rut the friction, comparatively 
slight at first, constantly increased throughout his 
Presidency, until towards the close of his second term 
the struggle between the Executive and the leaders 
of his party in Congress was exceedingly bitter, and was 
the absorbing subject of political discussion. 

Roosevelt's enemies accused him of being an extreme 
radical, of being full of visionary ideas, even of being 
unbalanced; while his friends charged that his opponents 
were the venal representatives of special monopolistic 
interests and conscienceless exploiters of the public 
lands and other natural resources. His own estimate 
of his opponents was both sane and just. While he 
knew that many of those who were opposed to him in 
and out of Congress were in fact the tools of men who 
were willing to corrupt public servants for their own 
selfish gain, he also knew that many, perhaps the 
majority, were convinced — strange as it may now 
appear — that the welfare of the nation could be best 
promoted by leaving things alone, that such evils as 
impure food and the extortions of monopolies could not 
be cured by regulation, and that the remaining natural 
resources of the nation should be handed over as rapidly 
as possible without reservation to private interests. 

The details of this struggle between the Executive 
on the one hand and those in control of his party in 
Congress on the other have already been set forth in 
the account I have given of Roosevelt's course towards 
the control of trusts, the regulation of railroads and 
the fight for the preservation of natural resources. The 
effect of the contest was two-fold. At the first part 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 323 

of his second term he was probably at the zenith of 
his power over Congress. From then on his power 
steadily declined. As he sent in message after message, 
now on this subject and now on that, the members 
paid steadily less and less attention to his recommen- 
dations. On the other hand, while many persons 
doubtless tended to become weary at the very multitude 
of his projects and controversies, his hold on their con- 
fidence did not diminish. The great majority of the 
Republican voters began to see the real and fundamental 
significance of the contest. They were back of his con- 
servation policies and his attitude towards big business. 
He had succeeded in making the party as represented 
by its rank and file a progressive Federalist party, 
although he had failed to break the hold of the reac- 
tionary element on the party organization in Congress 
and in the states. 

These were the existing political conditions as the 
time for the Republican Convention to nominate Roose- 
velt's successor approached. Roosevelt was tremen- 
dously anxious to have follow him in the White House 
a man who would carry out his policies, especially his 
conservation policies — one who would move as he was 
moving from the conservation of the natural to the 
conservation of the human resources of the nation. 
He desired a successor who would take a vital interest 
in the movement just beginning to make itself felt for 
what has since become known as social legislation, 
such as child labor laws and laws improving conditions 
affecting the employment of women in industry. At 
the same time, he realized that all the party machinery 
was in the hands of the conservatives; furthermore, 
that it would remain in their hands in spite of any- 



324 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

thing he could do, because at that time the direct 
election of delegates to national conventions at party 
primaries had not come into general use. He had to 
rely on his own popularity with the voters, and the 
fear of the average politician to appear to ally him- 
self openly with interests inimical to the public welfare, 
to force the convention to nominate a progressive 
Republican as his successor. 

It is probable that any one of half a dozen persons 
would have met with his approval, as the Republican 
Presidential nominee. It was not long, however, before 
it was evident that his Secretary of War, William H. 
Taft, would command the greatest political support. 
When this fact became clear, he devoted himself to 
securing Taft's nomination. In this he was successful, 
but he was afraid to go further and insist on the nomi- 
nation as Vice-President of a man representing his own 
point of view towards public questions; neither did 
he attempt to force a reorganization alon<* progressive 
lines of the National Committee, the body which is 
created at each National Convention to represent the 
party between conventions. The conservatives acqui- 
escing in his desire for the nomination of Taft, he allowed 
them without a contest to remain in complete control 
of the party machinery. This course was taken by him 
because he was afraid that if he tried to exert his influ- 
ence further than the selection of the Presidential 
candidate, he would produce a reaction which might 
defeat Taft. 

Nevertheless, his acquiescence in the control by his 
political opponents over the Vice-Presidential nomination 
and the entire machinery of the party for the next 
four years was the greatest political mistake of his life. 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 325 

It was due to what we may regard as perhaps his only 
serious weakness as a political leader — his tendency 
to underrate his own strength. Hopeful, buoyant, 
sanguine of the future for the things he was interested 
in, with almost sublime confidence in the ultimate 
triumph of right principles, he never at any given 
time fully appreciated the extent of the hold he then 
had on the American people. Whether he would have 
succeeded in making the organization of his party more 
responsive to progressive ideals and the will of the 
majority of its voters, had he extended his fight in 
1908 for the nomination of Taft to a general fight on 
the Old Guard, we may not know; but the probabilities 
are that he would have met with a considerable measure 
of success. As it was, political conditions in the Repub- 
lican party on the 4th of March, 1909, left his successor 
the nominal leader of a party under the real control 
of Roosevelt's bitter opponents. 

Mr. Taft's selection of Mr. Ballinger to be his Secre- 
tary of the Interior was a great disappointment to those 
whose primary interest was the continuation of Roose- 
velt's attitude towards the use of public lands and the 
conservation of the natural resources of the nation. 
They had hoped that the new President would continue 
in that office James R. Garfield, on whom Roosevelt 
had placed great dependence and in whom the conser- 
vationists had absolute reliance. 

Roosevelt's last contention with Congress was over 
his Presidential commissions, principally the National 
Conservation Commission and the Country Life Com- 
mission. As we have already noted, one of his last acts 
as President was to sign a bill passed by Congress con- 
taining a rider which prohibited any officer or employee 



326 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of the government from serving on any commission 
or committee not authorized by Congress. When he 
signed the bill, he wrote a memorandum to the effect 
that he regarded the restrictive provision as an uncon- 
stitutional interference with his power as President 
to obtain information to lay before Congress, and that 
if he was to continue President he would disregard 
the provision. President Taft followed the congres- 
sional mandate. As a consequence, the whole plan of 
inter-departmental commissions, which had laid the 
foundation of the conservation policies by supplying 
the necessary scientific information, fell to the ground. 
When Roosevelt was on his hunting trip in Africa, 
things political in this country were rapidly taking 
on new and strange aspects. The President called an 
extra session of Congress to fulfil the party's pledge 
to revise the tariff. The debate over the Payne Tariff 
Bill developed into a struggle between those forces in 
Congress which in the main had opposed Roosevelt 
and the progressive or Roosevelt Republicans. In this 
contest the new President believed that Payne, Aldrich 
and his associates were right and that the tariff bill 
which they succeeded in forcing through Congress, 
against the opposition of the progressive Republicans, 
was a good measure, fulfilling his own and his party's 
pledge in respect to the tariff. Practically all the pro- 
gressive Republicans believed that the President had 
allowed the reactionaries to trick him and to deceive 
the people; that the people had voted the Republican 
ticket on a pledge that the tariff should be revised down- 
wards, while the Payne Tariff Bill, they believed, in 
effect increased the duties. Factional party strife ran 
high and the Democrats were correspondingly rejoiced. 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 327 

By withdrawing water-power sites from entry, 
Roosevelt had prevented many of them from being 
taken by private interests. He then asked Congress 
for water-power legislation. Ballinger began to cancel 
these withdrawal orders. Gifford Pinchot at once pro- 
tested to the President. 

In August, while this matter was pending, a young 
special agent of the General Land Office, named Glavis, 
called on Pinchot and stated that Ballinger was about 
to patent improperly what were known as the Cun- 
ningham Coal Claims on the Bering River, back of 
Controller Bay, in Alaska; that Ballinger had been the 
attorney for the claimants, and that when the claims 
were patented they were to be transferred to the Gug- 
genheims. Glavis, under the advice of Pinchot, laid the 
matter before the President. The President dismissed 
Glavis from the service for making unwarranted charges 
against a superior officer, but his case was taken up 
by Collier's Weekly and made the subject of heated 
public discussion. Early in January, 1901, Senator 
Dolliver read in the Senate a letter addressed to him by 
Gifford Pinchot, in which the latter discussed and 
defended the methods used by the Forest Service in 
defense of the Roosevelt conservation policies. On the 
same day the President dismissed Pinchot. 

Out of these events grew the Pinchot-Glavis-Bal- 
linger controversy. At the President's request Congress 
appointed a joint committee in both Houses to inves- 
tigate the action of the Interior Department and also 
of the Forest Service. This committee sat throughout 
the winter and spring of 1910. There was no investi- 
gation of the Forest Service but there was a very 
extensive investigation of the Department of the Interior. 



328 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Both Pinchot and Glavis were represented by counsel, 
the former by Mr. George Wharton Pepper, of Phil- 
adelphia, and the latter by Mr. Louis D. Brandeis, 
now a Justice of the Supreme Court of the United 
States. The hearings of the committee were the principal 
subject of a political discussion which served to emphasize 
the widening breach between the administration and 
those who, during Roosevelt's administration, had been 
most enthusiastic for his domestic policies, especially 
conservation. The report of the majority was favorable 
to Mr. Ballinger; that of the minority adverse. The 
Cunningham claims were never patented and the water- 
power sites, except in a few cases, were never opened for 
entry. Mr. Ballinger retired as Secretary of the Interior 
in March, 1911. 

Roosevelt arrived at Khartoum on his way out 
from Africa, on March 14, 1910. One of those who 
met him was Mr. John Callan O'Laughlin, of the Chicago 
Tribune. Mr. O'Laughlin brought with him a letter 
from Pinchot, dated August 31, 1909, in which the 
latter set forth that the President had lost the confidence 
of the progressive Republicans in and out of Congress — 
not necessarily in his intentions, but in his ability to 
prevent the reactionary elements in the party from 
dominating his administration. His conclusions were 
based on the President's refusal to continue the national 
conservation commissions and other commissions in 
the face of congressional prohibition, the signing and 
commendation of the tariff bill, as well as his strictures 
to those opposed to that measure, and, finally, in the 
activities of his Secretary of the Interior, Ballinger. 

Mr. Pinchot, at Roosevelt's request, came to Europe 
and met him at Porto Maurizio, on the Riviera. From 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 329 

this time on, Roosevelt was convinced that much of 
the work he had accomplished as President in his fight 
to make the Republican party progressive would be 
lost unless on his return to this country he was prepared 
to take an active part in the advocacy of his conserva- 
tion and other policies. This of course is not saying 
that at this time he had any idea that he would become 
a candidate for the Republican nomination in 1912. 
He did believe, however, that it would be necessary 
for him to take a larger share in political discussions 
and a different attitude towards the Taft administra- 
tion than he had anticipated at the time of Mr. Taft's 
nomination. 

During the entire period of the progressive movement, 
which then began as an organized political movement, 
Roosevelt and Taft were inevitably estranged. It is, 
however, a satisfaction to know that time brought 
them together again. Those of us who took part in the 
contest, as well as the principals, came to realize that 
the fundamental differences between the two men were 
not in ideals of service and public welfare, but in interests, 
associations and temperament. They differed, too, in 
their conceptions of the Presidential office, as exem- 
plified in their respective attitudes towards the act 
of Congress prohibiting the President's availing himself 
of the services of officers and employees of the govern- 
ment on committees and commissions created by vol- 
untary executive order. 

Roosevelt, in his address on his arrival in New York, 
in June, 1910, as we have seen, expressed his eagerness 
to take part in the solution of the problems which pressed 
upon the nation. "This," he said, "is the duty of every 
citizen, but is peculiarly my duty; for any man who 



330 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

has ever been honored by being made President of the 
United States is thereby forever rendered the debtor 
of the American people and is bound throughout his 
life to remember this, his prime obligation." 

He went West and delivered several notable speeches, 
the first on August 31st, at Ossawatomie, on the "New 
Nationalism." In this speech he pointed out that many 
who praised Lincoln for solving the problems of his 
day "shrink from, or frantically denounce, those who 
are trying to meet the problems of the twentieth century 
in the spirit which was accountable for the successful 
solution of the problems of Lincoln's time." 

He then quoted Lincoln's statement that, "Labor 
is prior to, and independent of, capital; capital is only 
the fruit of labor and could never have existed but for 
labor. Labor is the superior of capital and deserves 
much the higher consideration. Capital has its rights 
which are as worthy of protection as any other rights. . . 
Nor should this lead to a war upon the owners of 
property. Property is the fruit of labor; property is 
desirable; it is a positive good in the world. Let not 
him who is houseless pull down the house of another, 
but let him work diligently and build one for himself, 
thus, by example, showing that his own shall be safe 
from violence when built." 

Roosevelt stated that in these words Lincoln took 
substantially the attitude that we ought to take, showing 
the proper sense of proportion in the relative estimates 
of human rights and property rights, and he added : 

"I stand for the Square Deal. But when I say that 
I am for the square deal I mean not merely that I stand 
for fair play under the present rules of the game, but 
that I stand for having those rules changed so as to 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 331 

work for a more substantial equality of opportunity 
and of reward for equally good service." 

He then goes on to point out that we must drive 
special interests out of politics; that the citizens of the 
United States must effectively control the mighty com- 
mercial forces which they have themselves called into 
being; that we must have complete and effective pub- 
licity of corporate affairs ; that we should have and enforce 
laws to prohibit the use of corporate funds directly or indi- 
rectly for political purposes; that we must have govern- 
ment supervision over capitalization; that franchises 
should never be granted except for a limited time, and 
that combinations in industry which he regarded as the 
result of imperative economic laws which cannot be 
repealed by political legislation, should be placed under 
effective governmental supervision. Turning to the 
right of the people to regulate the terms and conditions 
of labor, he advocated comprehensive workmen's com- 
pensation acts, as well as both state and national laws 
to regulate child labor, the work of women and the 
enforcement of better sanitary conditions for wage 
workers. 

Though all the things he advocated have since been 
embodied in law by most of the states and by the Federal 
Government, it was generally regarded at the time as 
an advanced radical platform. 

In the closing part of the address, he coupled this 
"radical platform" with his inborn federalism, pointing 
out that: "Too often the Federal Government, and 
even the Federal judiciary, has permitted itself to be 
employed for purely negative purposes — that is to 
thwart the action of the states while not permitting 
effective Federal action in its place. 



332 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

"I do not ask for over-centralization," he said, 
"but I do ask that we work in a spirit of broad and 
far-reaching nationalism when we work for what concerns 
our people as a whole. We are all Americans. Our 
common interests are as broad as the continent. I 
speak to you here in Kansas exactly as I would speak 
in New York or Georgia, for the most vital problems 
are those which affect us all alike. The National Gov- 
ernment belongs to the whole American people, and 
where the whole American people are interested, that 
interest can be guarded effectively only by the National 
Government. The betterment which we seek must be 
accomplished, I believe, mainly through the National 
Government." 

The speech created a profound impression. The 
great body of the American people were in a mood to 
applaud its spirit and accept its definite recommendations. 
In his subsequent speeches in Colorado, and at St. Paul 
before the Conservation Congress, he reiterated the 
main points of what he had said at Ossawatomie, 
although at St. Paul he naturally emphasized the con- 
servation policies which were so dear to his heart. 

On leaving the White House, he had accepted the 
position of contributing editor of the Outlook. From 
now on, in his capacity of editor, as well as in his addresses 
and public speeches, he continued to urge, now from 
this angle and now from that, the policies of industrial 
justice, adequate control of large combinations of capital, 
conservation, and new nationalism. Twice again, in 
his almost single-handed struggle for "preparedness," 
and in his speeches during the World War — he was, as 
a private citizen, to perform the wonderful and unpar- 
alleled task of educating a democracy of eighty million 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 333 

people to the point of demanding and carrying through 
concrete action on the reforms he advocated. 

In this, his first great educational campaign as a 
private citizen, as he made his ideas clearer and clearer, 
the number of the members of his party who felt that 
these ideas could only be successfully carried out under his 
leadership as President became more and more numerous. 
To them were added others who were moved by the 
consideration — peculiarly appealing to the professional 
politician — that he was the only Republican who could 
be elected, in view of the feeling then existing in regard 
to the Taft administration. At any rate, it is certain 
that the attempt to gather the progressive forces around 
the candidacy for the Republican nomination of Senator 
Robert LaFollette, of Wisconsin, a life-long and con- 
sistent supporter of what were then known as radical 
measures, was a failure, although the effort was supported 
by many men close to Roosevelt. After the campaign 
for LaFollette had been fairly launched, each day made 
it clearer that he could not be nominated. This was no 
reflection on the Wisconsin Senator. Roosevelt, by 
his acts as President and even more by his Ossawatomie 
and subsequent speeches and writings, had made himself, 
in the eyes of those who believed that they were carrying 
the spirit of Lincoln into the solution of modern indus- 
trial problems, the very embodiment of the progressive 
movement. To enter the fight against the renomination 
of Taft under the banner of any other was to try to 
win an Austerlitz without Napoleon. 

Roosevelt neither encouraged nor discouraged this 
movement. The very success of his efforts to educate 
the people to the importance of progressive principles 
and the intensity of feeling in regard to the Taft admin- 



334 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

istration, placed him in a most difficult position. The 
nomination was the last thing he desired. He saw clearly 
that to accept it would be to lay himself open to the 
charge of treachery to his successor, and that the charge 
would be believed by all those who, though often admiring 
much that he did as President, had failed to see the 
significance of his struggle with Congress and were 
blind to or out of sympathy with the main purpose 
of his whole course as President and his efforts to make 
and keep the Republican party a party capable of meeting 
by affirmative action modern social and industrial 
problems. Furthermore, though it is a consideration 
that I know he brushed aside, he probably did have 
the desire to be again President, and he had no belief 
that he would ever again reach the Presidency unless 
he allowed Taft, unopposed by him, to be nominated 
in 1912. His turn would then come in 1916. 

On the other hand, this fight to make the Republican 
party progressive was primarily his fight. He realized 
that circumstances might arise — as he believed later 
they did arise — which would make it a moral necessity 
for him to become a candidate for renomination. And 
therefore he was obliged to leave himself free to act 
and to refuse to answer the question: "Will you be a 
candidate?" — knowing that his enemies and even many 
of his friends would construe his silence into a plot to 
further his own candidacy. 

Those progressives, however, who were active in 
political life were not silent. They clamored for him 
to become a candidate. He had no idea he could be 
nominated. But they, in closer touch with the current 
of political thought in their own communities, believed 
that he could. On February 10, 1912, the Governors 



THE PROGRESSIVE MOVEMENT 335 

of seven states — West Virginia, Nebraska, New Hamp- 
shire, Wyoming, Michigan, Kansas and Missouri, met 
in Chicago. They sent him a letter in which they stated 
that a large majority of the Republican voters of the 
country favored his nomination; that his candidacy 
would insure success in the next campaign; that he, 
better than any other man, represented the principles 
and policies which are necessary for the happiness and 
prosperity of the country, and finally appealing to him to 
declare that he would accept the nomination. The con- 
cluding paragraph of the letter was expressed as follows: 

"In submitting this request, we are not considering 
your personal interests. We do not regard it as proper 
to consider either the interests or the preference of 
any man as regards the nomination for the Presidency. 
We are expressing our sincere belief and best judgment 
as to what is demanded of you in the interests of the 
people as a whole. And we feel that you would be unre- 
sponsive to a plain public duty if you should decline 
to accept the nomination, coming as the voluntary 
expression of the wishes of a majority of the Republican 
voters of the United States, through the action of their 
delegates in the next National Convention." 

Subsequently the signers of the appeal came to 
New York and had a conference with Roosevelt at 
the house of his sister, Mrs. Douglas Robinson. 

On February 25th, Roosevelt issued a formal reply 
to this appeal. He said that he agreed with them that 
the matter was not one to be decided with any reference 
to the personal preference or interests of any man, 
and that he would accept the nomination if it was ten- 
dered to him. From that moment, the greatest party 
struggle of modern times began. 



CHAPTER XXII 

The Right of the People to Rule 

THROUGHOUT his Presidency, Roosevelt was 
developing the progressive policies affecting 
industrial combinations, public lands and natural 
resources. In the campaign of education on which he 
entered on his return from Europe to defend these 
policies, his mind, as we have seen, was mainly directed 
to these things, except that we notice an ever-increasing 
emphasis on the necessity for the correction of con- 
ditions affecting labor. Circumstances now forced another 
side of the progressive movement to the front — the effort 
to give the voters a greater direct control over what 
may be called the machinery of government. 

Since the first quarter of the nineteenth century, 
there had existed in practically all our states universal 
manhood suffrage. Members of the legislature, the 
chief executive officers and, except in parts of New 
England, the judiciary were, as they still are, elected 
by popular vote. But legislation, except as embodied 
in state constitutions, was never passed on by the people 
directly, and an executive officer or judge, once elected, 
could not be removed by popular vote, though he could 
be removed by the legislature in impeachment pro- 
ceedings. Furthermore, though the individual voters 
passed directly on the question of which of several 
nominees for the same office should be elected, they 
did not pass directly on who should be nominated. 
The system of both parties was to nominate by party 

(336) 



THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO RULE 337 

conventions, the members of the party electing delegates 
to the various conventions, at the primaries. 

Throughout the period of Roosevelt's presidency, 
but more especially during the three years that passed 
immediately after he left office, the movement to give 
the voters greater direct control over party and legis- 
lative machinery and executive action had been growing 
in volume and intensity. Already the system of nom- 
inating party candidates for local and state offices and 
delegates to national conventions had been, in many 
states, changed in whole or in part from the convention 
system to the system now generally in force of nomi- 
nating candidates at primary elections, in which each 
member of the party votes directly for the candidate of 
his choice. 

In the West and Northwest, considerable progress 
had been made also toward giving the voters greater 
direct control over legislation by the adoption of the 
initiative and the referendum; the initiative being 
the power of a fraction of the voters to suggest an act, 
which, being adopted by the majority of the voters 
voting on the question, becomes a law; the referendum 
being the power of a fraction of the voters to require 
that an act adopted by the legislature shall not become 
a law until ratified by a majority of the voters voting 
on the question of its ratification. Furthermore, progress 
had also been made by the advocates of the recall, or 
the right of a fraction of the voters to have all the voters 
vote on the question of whether a person elected for a 
given term should serve out the term for which he was 
elected or be recalled to private life. The recall was 
in some states not only applied to executive offices 
but to judicial offices. 

92 



338 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Roosevelt did not originate this side of the pro- 
gressive movement, although his successful insistence, 
as President, on the government's being run in the 
public interest, was a great stimulus to it. One of the 
effects produced by his contest with Congress was the 
growth of a popular demand that what were termed 
"special interests" should not run the country, and the 
belief became general that every change in the machinery 
of government which gave the voter greater direct 
power made it easier for the people and harder for the 
"special interests" to control. Large numbers of per- 
sons were, and still are, convinced that it is easier for 
a few men, backed by organized wealth, to control a 
nominating convention than a primary election — easier 
for them to control the majority of the members of a 
legislature than the majority of the electorate of a 
state. 

On his return from Africa, Roosevelt inevitably, 
as one deeply interested in public questions, began to 
turn his attention to this new phase of the progressive 
movement. His whole attitude from the start, with 
minor reservations, was sympathetic. He was a true 
disciple of Lincoln. He had an abiding trust in the 
ultimate wisdom of the people. He did not believe 
that any particular class of the people was a better 
judge of what was wise or right than the whole people. 

On February 21, 1912, four days before he formally 
announced that he would accept the Republican nomi- 
nation if it were tendered to him, he addressed the 
Ohio Constitutional Convention in a speech entitled, 
"A Charter of Democracy." 

The keynote of the speech was the obligation of the 
members of the convention to draft a constitution 



THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO RULE 339 

which would enable the people of the state to control 
the government and obtain the legislation which they 
desired. 

"I believe in pure democracy," he said. "With 
Lincoln, I hold that 'this country, with its institutions, 
belongs to the people who inhabit it. Whenever they 
shall grow weary of the existing government, they can 
exercise their constitutional right of amending it.' We 
Progressives believe that the people have the right, 
the power, and the duty to protect themselves and their 
own welfare; that human rights are supreme over all 
other rights; that wealth should be the servant, not 
the master, of the people. . . We are engaged in one 
of the great battles of the age-long contest waged against 
privilege on behalf of the common welfare. We hold 
it a prime duty of the people to free our government 
from the control of money in politics. For this purpose 
we advocate, not as ends in themselves, but as weapons 
in the hands of the people, all governmental devices 
which will make the representatives of the people more 
easily and certainly responsive to the people's will." 

He gave his unqualified support to the initiative 
and the referendum, though he emphasized the fact 
that provision should be made to prevent their being 
used either wantonly or too frequently, saying that 
"in the great majority of cases, it is far better that 
action on legislative matters should be taken by those 
specially delegated to perform the task; in other words, 
that the work should be done by the experts chosen 
to perform it. But where the men thus delegated fail 
to perform their duty, then it should be in the power 
of the people themselves to perform the duty." 

He was always much more doubtful about the prac- 



340 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

tical wisdom of giving the people the power to recall 
an elected executive officer. "As to the recall," he said, 
"I do not believe that there is any great necessity for 
it as regards short-term elective officers. On abstract 
grounds, I was originally inclined to be hostile to it. 
I know of one case where it was actually used with 
mischievous results. On the other hand, in three cases 
in municipalities on the Pacific coast which have come 
to my knowledge it was used with excellent results. 
I believe it should be generally provided, but with such 
restrictions as will make it available only when there 
is a widespread and genuine public feeling among a 
majority of the voters." 

In regard to the advisability of permitting the people 
to recall by popular vote a judge before the expiration 
of his term of office he was still more doubtful. He knew 
personally many judges who were wholly unfit to hold 
judicial positions. He saw clearly the causes which 
at that time created the popular demand that the people 
should have a right to get rid of a judge whom they had 
ceased to trust, and yet at the same time he realized 
the importance, as he himself expressed it, of "an inde- 
pendent and upright judiciary which fearlessly stands 
for the right, even against popular clamor," and he 
pointed out that such a judiciary, provided it "also 
understands and sympathizes with popular needs, is a 
great asset to popular government." His whole attitude 
at that time, and I believe subsequently, was that under 
usual state conditions, the power to recall judges is an 
unnecessary and harmful power, but that there may 
arise conditions in which the power of the people to 
recall a judge will become a beneficial power. 

The clause of the constitution which forbids depriving 



THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO RULE 341 

any person of "liberty or property without due process 
of law/' had been repeatedly applied by the courts 
to nullify much-needed social legislation. The provi- 
sion simply means that any act of a state legislature 
is void which violates current fundamental ideas of 
what is fair. Roosevelt believed that judges, through 
ignorance of social and industrial conditions, even among 
wage workers, often regarded social legislation based 
on enlightened ideas of justice as fundamentally unfair. 

When he was in the New York State Legislature, 
the Court of Appeals had declared unconstitutional 
a law which forbade making cigars in tenement houses, 
and had criticised it as an assault upon the "hallowed 
influence of home. ,, Roosevelt had seen the dwellings 
to which these words were applied and realized that the 
judges who could thus describe a single room in which 
two families lived, ate and slept, were out of touch 
with fundamental social needs. This case made a deep 
impression on him. 

When he proposed "the recall of judicial decisions," 
he meant that when the Supreme Court of a state declared 
a piece of social legislation to be an unconstitutional 
attack upon property rights, the question should be 
referred to popular vote. If the people by their vote 
sustained the statute, it should be law in spite of the 
court's opinion that it violated the constitution. 

This was in effect a method of amending the consti- 
tution. But many people misunderstood Roosevelt's 
proposal. They thought that he intended that an 
appeal should lie from the Supreme Court of a state 
to the voters of the state, so that if in a given case the 
Supreme Court should give judgment in favor of Jones 
the people might reverse the judgment and cause 



342 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

it to be entered in favor of Smith. The reaction of mem- 
bers of the Bar and the conservative elements of the 
country, as well as of large numbers of those in sympathy 
with all the rest of his address, was, as a consequence, 
prompt, vigorous and condemnatory. 

Roosevelt, of course, never dreamed of proposing 
that the reversal of the decision of the court as to the 
constitutionality of the act would reverse the court's 
judgment in favor of the plaintiff or the defendant, 
and he perhaps was never convinced that there could 
be any honest misunderstanding of what he meant. 
He often pointed out that he had never said that the 
judgment of the court should be reversed, but merely 
that the decision that the act was unconstitutional 
should be recalled, and that under his proposal, there- 
fore, the only effect of a vote in favor of the act by the 
people would be to make the act a law from the time 
when the favorable vote was recorded. 

The issue really presented by his proposal was this: 
When the court declares that an act deprives persons 
of liberty or property without due process of law, should 
the adoption of a constitutional amendment by popular 
vote be the only remedy or should the people also have 
the right by popular vote to assert that that particular 
act does not relate to the constitutional requirement 
of due process of law? 

Time usually enables us to view bitter political 
controversies in a dispassionate spirit. The intense 
feeling that raged for months over the proposal to "recall 
judicial decisions" is not an exception to this rule. Those 
of us who were members of the Progressive party see 
now that it was not unreasonable for those who read 
Roosevelt's address to the Ohio Constitutional Con- 



THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO RULE 343 

vention to believe that he intended that the judgment 
for one individual given by the highest state court should 
be reversible at the polls. We can also admit that, 
viewing the proposal as they did, they were entirely 
justified in their unmeasured condemnation. On the 
other hand, the most conservative member of the Bar, 
though he may strongly disapprove the method for 
amending the constitution suggested by Roosevelt, 
will, if he understands it correctly, at least admit that 
it was not a revolutionary proposal. 

The shifting of popular interest makes the real 
issue raised by the proposal of no present moment. 
The general discussion and more widespread knowledge 
of social conditions have recently rendered it possible 
to maintain before the courts the constitutionality of 
any social legislation held by the prevailing morality 
or preponderating public opinion to be greatly or imme- 
diately necessary to the public welfare. The cause, there- 
fore, which created a desire to curb the power of judges 
to declare acts unconstitutional has largely disappeared 
and the recall of judicial decisions, never generally 
understood by its advocates or opponents, has passed 
to the realm of forgotten things. 

But on the course of Roosevelt's life, it had a pro- 
found effect. Looking back now over the events leading 
up to the Republican National Convention of 1912, 
it would appear almost certain that had he, in his address 
before the Ohio Convention, either refrained from 
making the proposal or had he called it a new method 
of amending the constitution, and carefully explained 
it so that it could not have been misunderstood, it is 
most probable that he would have been nominated 
at Chicago, and that the whole course of the recent 



344 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

history of the United States would have been other 
than it has been. As it was, the proposal, as understood, 
did not gain him adherents. On the contrary, it aroused 
to active opposition many who would otherwise have 
been neutral, or even friendly to his candidacy. 

Apart from his mistake in the way he presented his 
proposal affecting courts' decisions in constitutional 
questions, this speech before the Ohio Constitutional 
Convention was one of his greatest public utterances. 
On March 20th he made a still greater address in Carnegie 
Hall, New York, on "The Right of the People to Rule," 
perhaps the greatest public address he ever made. As 
I have stated in the introductory chapter of this history, 
those who were close to him at this period of his life 
realize that his making the fight for the Republican 
nomination was an act of supreme moral courage. He 
knew that many of his best friends and of his admirers 
would always misunderstand and misconstrue his 
motives. His true motives he never more clearly 
or eloquently expressed than in the concluding 
paragraphs of his Carnegie Hall address, in which 
he said: 

"Friends, our task as Americans is to strive for social 
and industrial justice, achieved through the genuine 
rule of the people. This is our end, our purpose. The 
methods for achieving the end are merely expedients, 
to be finally accepted or rejected according as actual 
experience shows that they work well or ill. But in 
our hearts we must have this lofty purpose, and we must 
strive for it in all earnestness and sincerity, or our work 
will come to nothing. In order to succeed we need leaders 
of inspired idealism, leaders to whom are granted great 
visions, who dream greatly and strive to make their 



THE RIGHT OF THE PEOPLE TO RULE 345 

dreams come true; who can kindle the people with the 
fire from their own burning souls. 

"The leader for the time being, whoever he may be, 
is but an instrument, to be used until broken and then 
to be cast aside; and if he is worth his salt, he will care 
no more when he is broken than a soldier cares when 
he is sent where his life is forfeit in order that the victory 
may be won. In the long fight for righteousness the 
watchword for all of us is, 'Spend and be spent.' It is 
of little matter whether any one man fails or succeeds; 
but the cause shall not fail, for it is the cause of man- 
kind. We, here in America, hold in our hands the hope 
of the world, the fate of the coming years; and shame 
and disgrace will be ours if in our eyes the light of high 
resolve is dimmed, if we trail in the dust the golden 
hopes of men. If on this new continent we merely build 
another country of great but unjustly divided material 
prosperity, we shall have done nothing; and we shall 
do as little if we merely set the greed of envy against 
the greed of arrogance, and thereby destroy the material 
well-being of all of us. To turn this government into 
government by a plutocracy or government by a mob 
would be to repeat on a larger scale the lamentable 
failures of the world that is dead. We stand against 
all tyranny, by the few, or by the many. We stand 
for the rule of the many in the interest of all of us, for 
the rule of the many in the spirit of courage, of common 
sense, of high purpose, above all, in a spirit of kindly 
justice towards every man and every woman." 



CHAPTER XXIII 

The Fight for the Nomination in 1912 

THE contest for delegates to the Republican 
National Convention began in February, 1912, 
and continued unremittingly until the middle 
of June. The overwhelming majority of the progressives 
desired the nomination of Roosevelt, though Senator 
LaFollette, of Wisconsin, and Senator Cummins, of 
Iowa, were supported by the progressives in their respec- 
tive states. LaFollette also had considerable support 
throughout the central and western states, though 
North Dakota was the only state other than Wisconsin 
in which his vote exceeded that cast for Roosevelt. 
The conservatives supported President Taft. 

The contest for the delegates cannot be described as 
a contest between the two factions to test their relative 
strength with the voters of the party. There was never 
really any doubt that the great majority of the Repub- 
licans desired the nomination of Roosevelt, any more 
than there was any doubt that a large number would 
not support the President if he were renominated. There- 
fore, the outcome of the contest for delegates depended 
on the party rules and on the laws of the different states 
regulating the selection of delegates. Whenever the 
delegates were selected by the. convention system, 
Taft delegates were chosen; while, except in New Eng- 
land, wherever the primary election laws permitted a 
free expression of preference by the voters, or a free 
choice of delegates pledged in advance to one or the 

(346) 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 347 

other of the candidates for the nomination, the progres- 
sive forces were practically everywhere overwhelmingly 
victorious. 

In all the Southern states except North Carolina, 
the Republican party was not a political party, but a 
collection of political groups led by Federal office 
holders. The delegates from these states, as in our 
previous Republican National Conventions when a Presi- 
dent sought renomination, were for the President. On 
the other hand, New Jersey, Wisconsin, North Dakota, 
Oregon and California had direct presidential preference 
primary laws; that is, each voter not only voted for 
delegates to the convention, but the names of the dif- 
ferent candidates for the Presidential nomination were 
printed on the ballot, each voter having the opportunity 
to indicate his preference. In all these states, the pro- 
gressives scored decisive victories. In North Dakota, 
out of 48,000 ballots cast, President Taft received between 
3,000 and 4,000, all the rest being divided between 
Roosevelt and LaFollette. In Wisconsin, Roosevelt's 
name was not on the ballot, and LaFollette won over 
the President by a majority of more than two to one. 
Roosevelt carried New Jersey by over 16,000, losing only 
two of the twenty-one counties, and securing a solid dele- 
gation in his favor. He carried California by 76,000. 

There were other states in which the laws provided 
for the election of delegates at the primaries, and in 
some of these states, as in Pennsylvania, the candidate 
for delegate could print on the ballot the name of the 
Presidential nominee for whom he intended to vote in 
the convention, if he were chosen a delegate. It was 
in some of these states that Roosevelt secured his great- 
est victories. On April 19th he carried Illinois by 



348 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

150,000; on April 13th he swept Pennsylvania, electing 
all but twelve of the seventy-six delegates from that 
state, including the twelve delegates at large; while on 
May 21st he carried Ohio by 30,000. He also carried 
Minnesota, West Virginia and Maryland. 

In New England there were some real contests 
in the states which have modern primary laws. Roose- 
velt secured the delegation from Maine. Massachusetts 
passed a preferential primary law. Under this law, 
the Roosevelt forces selected the eight delegates at 
large by a plurality of about 8,000 and ten of the twenty- 
eight district delegates. Under the law, the voter had 
the right to express his preference as between Presi- 
dential candidates. In this preferential vote, the Presi- 
dent had a plurality of about 4,000. Roosevelt at once 
issued a statement that he would expect the delegates 
at large to disregard their pledges and to support the 
President in the convention. 

The result of the elections in states having primary 
laws which permitted a free choice on the part of the 
voters was a great personal triumph for Roosevelt. 
In practically all these states, except California, the 
entire political machinery was in the hands of his oppo- 
nents, and his great victories resulted in the nomination 
for local offices and as Roosevelt delegates to the con- 
vention of many men who were new to and wholly 
inexperienced in the game of politics. There were of 
course exceptions. The decisive victory in Pennsylvania 
was due in no small part to the ability and experience 
in politics of one man, William Flinn, ably seconded 
by Mr. E. A. Van Valkenburg, of the Philadelphia 
North American, and Alexander P. Moore, of the Pitts- 
burgh Leader. 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 349 

Mr. Flinn was a resident of Pittsburgh, and the head 
of one of the largest contracting firms in the United 
States. In his younger days he was an associate of 
Chris Magee, the boss of Pittsburgh, and he had had a 
long experience in the State Senate. Defeated by the 
late Senator Quay, he had been for many years out 
of politics, but he knew the game, and like many another 
with a similar history, the career of Roosevelt as Presi- 
dent had made him an enthusiastic progressive and a 
determined opponent to the old type of machine politics, 
of which he had once been a supporter. Mr. Flinn, 
almost single-handed, undertook to organize the State 
of Pennsylvania. 

He discovered that the opposition forces expected 
to defeat most of the Roosevelt delegates by the ancient 
political device of securing several persons to run as 
Roosevelt men, thereby dividing the progressive vote. 
With such assistance as he could secure, though only 
one business man of prominence was willing to help, 
two Roosevelt delegates were selected in each district. 
No man who was in the employ of a large corporation 
or who owed money at the bank was taken, and rarely 
men who were in active politics. In the meantime, 
under the name of the Keystone Advertising Company 
of Pittsburgh, he secured the names and addresses 
of the 1,600,000 voters in the state. Purchasing twenty- 
two tons of postal cards, he sent to each voter, immedi- 
ately before the election, the names of the bona fide 
Roosevelt delegates and their alternates in his district. 
The task of addressing these postal cards and printing 
the names of between four and five hundred national, 
alternate and state delegates was enormous, especially 
as delegates could and, in spite of the care taken in 



350 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

their selection, did withdraw up to within two weeks 
of the election. The work was done so quickly and 
quietly that the opposition did not realize what was going 
forward until it was too late to counteract the effect. 
The fact that the sending out of merely one postal card to 
each voter in the state cost $23,000 shows the enormous 
expense of conducting a modern political campaign. 

After all, however, it was Roosevelt's own per- 
sonality and labors that made success possible. Always 
a vigorous campaigner, he made what the newspapers 
aptly described as a whirlwind campaign through each 
of the principal states in which a primary election 
was to take place, immediately prior to the election. 
Never had the proverbial "oldest inhabitant" seen 
such crowds — never such enthusiasm. And those who 
heard him heard something more than good campaign 
oratory. He had a double message to tell — the right of 
the people to govern themselves, and the necessity of 
obtaining, through the rule of the people, greater social 
and industrial justice. Both messages were dear to his 
heart, and he had already laid the foundations for his 
arguments in a series of great speeches. 

In spite of these victories at the primaries, the ulti- 
mate result was in the greatest doubt. The President 
secured practically all the Southern delegates. He also 
secured, though the delegates were unpledged, all the 
delegates from the great State of New York. In that 
state the primary election, especially in New York 
County, was conducted so loosely that in many of the 
districts there was practically no election at all, while 
in at least 400 out of the 1,694 election districts some- 
thing was lacking — ballots, tally sheets or election 
officials. Furthermore, the President secured a number 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 351 

of delegates, though far fewer than his opponents, in 
the states having good primary laws, and as has been 
stated, practically all the delegates in those states in 
which the old convention system of selecting delegates 
prevailed. 

About the middle of May, the New York Tribune, 
favorable to Taft, claimed 410 delegates for the Presi- 
dent, conceding only 251 to Roosevelt; while the New 
York Mail, favorable to Roosevelt, claimed that he had 
291 delegates and conceded only 232 to the President. 
The total number of delegates elected and to be elected 
was 1,078, and a bare majority, or 540, was sufficient 
to secure the nomination. Only in those states which 
had Presidential primaries was the result unquestioned. 
In the other states, contest after contest between rival 
delegates, each claiming that they were entitled to seats 
in the convention, was filed with the National Com- 
mittee — the body charged with the duty of making 
up the temporary roll of the convention. When, in June, 
a short time before the convention, the last state had 
selected delegates, no fewer than 220 contests were 
before the National Committee. 

The National Committee was composed of one 
member from each state, each delegate having been 
selected four years before by the delegates from his 
state to the National Convention of 1908. The forces 
supporting the President had absolute control of the 
committee. If they used that control to place the 
Taft delegates on the temporary roll of the convention 
in practically every contested case, without any real 
regard to the merits of the controversy, then the con- 
servative forces would be able to control the organization 
of the convention. If they weakened in their apparent 



352 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

determination to do this, because of the great popular 
outcry against it, they would lose control of the 
convention, and Roosevelt would certainly be nominated. 
They did not weaken. Until Missouri was reached in 
the progress through the alphabetical roll of the contested 
cases, only one case was decided in favor of a Roosevelt 
delegate, and many of the decisions of the committee 
were well calculated to arouse the fierce resentment 
and hot indignation of the progressives. 

In the Ninth Alabama district a convention of 
thirty delegates was held, of whom eighteen were 
Roosevelt men and twelve Taft men. Two Roosevelt 
delegates to the National Convention were selected; 
whereupon the twelve Taft men withdrew, held a con- 
vention of their own, and selected two Taft delegates. 
The National Committee seated the Taft delegates. 
In the Thirteenth Indiana district a convention of 
ninety-seven delegates was held. On a viva voce vote, 
the chairman declared the Taft delegates elected, 
and immediately adjourned the convention amid great 
disorder. Subsequently, fifty-one of the delegates to 
that convention made affidavit that they had voted 
for the Roosevelt delegates, and three took affidavit 
that they had voted for other delegates, but not for 
Taft's supporters. The National Committee seated the 
Taft delegates, on the ground that it could not question 
the decision of the chairman of the convention. 

In the Indiana State Convention, which selected the 
delegates at large from that state, the Taft delegates 
from one county, whose seats were contested, were 
placed on the temporary roll by the Credentials Com- 
mittee, and were thereupon allowed to vote as to whether 
they should retain those seats or not; and as a result, 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 353 

the Taf t forces assumed control and sent a Taf t delegation 
to Chicago. With the contested seats left out, the Roose- 
velt men had a clear majority in the State Convention. 
The National Committee seated the Taft delegates 
at large from Indiana. 

In one large county in Arizona, a majority of the 
county committee caused a primary to be held, at which 
the Roosevelt delegates to the State Convention were 
victorious over the Taft delegates by an enormous 
majority. Subsequently, the minority of the county 
committee met and selected Taft delegates. As a result, 
the State Convention sent a Taft delegation to Chicago. 
The National Committee seated the Taft delegates. 

The case which aroused the greatest interest and 
indignation was that of two delegates from California. 
The state law provided that all the delegates from the 
state should be elected from the state at large, and 
not by districts. At the primary election, Roosevelt 
carried the state by 77,000, and a solid delegation 
pledged to him was elected. There had been no question 
by any one as to the law, prior to the primary, and the 
Taft candidates for delegates went into the primary 
without making any conditions or protests. It was 
claimed before the National Committee that in one 
congressional district in San Francisco the Taft dele- 
gates resident in that district received more votes than 
the two Roosevelt delegates, and that the rules of the 
National Committee did not permit the election of all 
the delegates from a state at large, but required each 
state to send two delegates from each congressional 
district, no matter what the law of the state might 
provide. In spite of the fact that there were no district 
delegates and no district voting, the National Com- 

23 



354 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

mittee seated the two Taft delegates from San Francisco. 
An analysis of the contests would seem to show 
that there were seventy-two Roosevelt delegates excluded 
who might have been, and some of whom certainly 
would have been, seated had the National Committee 
acted in fact — as it was supposed to act in theory — as 
a judicial body. 

As, one after the other, these and other similar 
decisions of the National Committee were announced 
and it became increasingly evident that the conservative 
forces were determined to prevent Roosevelt's nomi- 
nation, the demand from his lieutenants in Chicago 
that he should go to that city and take charge of the 
fight became insistent. The convention was to meet 
on Tuesday, June 18th. Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt left 
Oyster Bay for New York on the morning of Friday, 
the 14th, but even then he withheld a final decision on 
the question whether he would or would not go to 

* Chicago, saying, as he slipped into his car: "We may 
fly back here tonight, and, by gracious, I hope we do." 
The hope was not to be fulfilled, and in spite of the storm 
of criticism which his going to Chicago aroused, it was 
the right thing for him to do. There had been a leak 
in his private phone to Chicago; there were compli- 

•^ cations which made it essential that he should be on 
the spot. The fight was essentially his fight. Thousands 
of men in all parts of the country had joined in this 
supreme effort to make the Republican party a radical 
or progressive party because he had created and was 
willing to lead the movement. The action of the National 
Committee on the contests created an unprecedented 
situation. His ' adherents needed and were entitled to 
have something better than his long-distance advice. 



Cu «j 



«■' o n 




THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 355 

The Roosevelt party left the Grand Union Station 
at 5:30 on the afternoon of the day they left Oyster 
Bay. Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt skilfully avoided the 
enormous crowd waiting to see him off by reaching 
the train by the freight elevator, thus avoiding the 
regular entrances. But the next day, when the train 
arrived in Chicago, there was no avoiding the crowd 
of more than fifty thousand people that broke through 
the police lines and jammed the platform, pushing, 
yelling and cheering. As his automobile passed through 
the streets from the station to the Congress Hotel 
on Michigan Avenue, it pushed its way through packed 
masses of people, ahead, behind and — at the cross 
streets — on either side, nothing but people wedged in like 
pins as far as the eye could see. Everybody yelled; 
everybody howled, and all were borne along by the 
irresistible force of the delighted mob. Rarely had 
any public man in this country aroused such intense 
enthusiasm. Everything combined to this end — his 
great popularity, the wonderful fight he had made, 
the deep and widespread conviction that his enemies 
were plotting to steal the nomination he had won, and 
that he was there to fight that theft to the end. 

Chicago went wild. For seven days — all day long 
and far into the night — the excitement continued. 
Great crowds filled the streets in front of his hotel, 
jammed the corridors and surged through the Roosevelt 
headquarters. Bands there were innumerable. Each 
state delegation seemed to have one. A large proportion 
of the crowd, not content with the strength of their 
own voices, procured mechanical devices to increase 
the noise. The Roosevelt headquarters were in the 
Florentine room, at the Congress Hotel, a large room 



356 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

on the second floor at the north end. In this room some- 
body was usually speaking. Anybody could speak 
that wanted to, and the crowd poured in one door and 
out the other, cheering or repeating over and over again, 
"We want Teddy! We want Teddy!" 

Of course no business was transacted in these head- 
quarters, unless there was a meeting of delegates, and 
then it usually took more than ten minutes to clear 
the place. Mr. and Mrs. Roosevelt had their own per- 
sonal apartments and Roosevelt had a suite of rooms 
as his personal headquarters in the northeast corner 
of the same floor. The doors were guarded by wise 
persons who knew who should and who should not 
be admitted. There were a goodly number of favored 
ones who succeeded in being admitted. Inside, in the 
reception room, there was an ever-changing and usually 
intensely interesting group of men whose names were 
well known from one end of the country to the other 
for what they had accomplished. 

Roosevelt himself was usually in an inner room, 
seeing one or two persons at a time. Occasionally, 
however, he would come out to the reception room, 
and when he did the vigorous force of his personality 
was reflected in the increased animation of the entire 
company. When there was nothing for those in the 
reception room to do — and a good deal of the time 
the majority had nothing to do — they would use up 
their energy in fruitless discussions and in the passing 
on of what always proved to be false rumors that this 
or that delegate was about to abandon Taft. 

On Monday evening Roosevelt addressed a great 
audience at the Auditorium. He had necessarily been 
much interrupted in the preparation of this address, 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 357 

and its substance and delivery left much to be desired, 
but the concluding words rang all over the country: 
"We stand at Armageddon and we battle for the Lord." 
To his opponents this was a mere catch phrase, but 
it thoroughly expressed his own motives for making 
the fight. 

Later on, the same evening, at a meeting of the 
Roosevelt delegates, it was determined that when the 
convention was called to order by Victor Rosewater, 
the chairman of the National Committee, Governor 
Hadley of Missouri, the Roosevelt floor leader, should 
make a motion that only the delegates whose seats 
were uncontested should participate in the proceedings 
of the convention until the contests were decided. If 
this motion were ruled out of order, he was to appeal 
from the decision of the chair. If the chair allowed 
the delegates whose seats were contested to vote on this 
appeal, he was to appeal again from the decision, demand 
another roll call on that appeal, and so on, ad infinitum. 
Had this program been carried out, Rosewater, to prevent 
an indefinite series of appeals and roll-calls, would have 
been obliged to deny Governor Hadley's right to raise 
the point of order, and in the confusion which would 
have inevitably followed, two conventions would have 
been organized at the same time and place. The split 
in the Republican party would have taken place, but 
the progressives would not have left the party and this 
difference we may be sure would have had a decided 
effect on the subsequent history of the country. 

But the program was changed at the last moment. 
When Mr. Rosewater called the convention to order, 
Governor Hadley moved that the delegates whose 
seats had been contested be excluded from participating 



358 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

in the proceedings until their right to participate had 
been determined by the majority of the delegates whose 
seats were not contested. After debate, this motion 
was ruled out of order on the ground that there was 
nothing before the house except the nominations for 
temporary chairman. But from this decision no appeal 
was taken by the Roosevelt forces, and on the subsequent 
election for temporary chairman, which was of course 
participated in by the seventy-two delegates whose 
seats were contested, Elihu Root, the candidate of the 
Taft forces, was elected. 

From the moment the convention was organized 
by the anti-progressive forces, everything in the con- 
vention proceeded, if not without fierce dispute, crimi- 
nation and recrimination, nevertheless with clock-like 
regularity to the inevitable end. 

A Credentials Committee was appointed, consisting 
of one member from each state, elected by the delegates 
from the state. The delegates taking part included 
those whose seats were contested, and of course the Taft 
forces thus obtained control of the committee. 

An occurrence took place at the first meeting of 
this committee which very nearly precipitated an 
immediate break. A motion was made to adopt a set 
of rules which would have excluded the introduction 
of any evidence on behalf of the contesting delegates. 
Hearing that these rules had been adopted, Roosevelt 
sent word requesting his adherents to withdraw from 
the committee and all but three did withdraw. The 
representative from Pennsylvania, Mr. Lex N. Mitchell, 
however, remained and persuaded the committee to 
adopt more reasonable rules, after which the other 
Roosevelt members returned, and the formal break 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 359 

was postponed until the conclusion of the convention. 
For more than an hour, however, everybody believed 
that the end had come. 

The Credentials Committee reported against the 
contesting Roosevelt delegates. Governor Hadley made 
a motion that the contesting delegates should not take 
part in the decision of the contests. This motion was of 
course laid upon the table by a majority which was 
secured only by permitting the delegates whose seats 
were contested to vote on the motion. Then the indi- 
vidual contests were taken up. In each case the Taft 
forces held together and laid on the table the motion 
to seat the Roosevelt delegates, but in every instance 
the vote of the seventy-two contested delegates was 
necessary to secure the majority. 

The closest and the critical vote was that on the 
California contest, where the two Taft delegates from 
San Francisco had been seated in defiance of the primary 
law of the state. The vote stood 542 to 529 in favor 
of the Taft delegates. Had this vote gone the other 
way, there would unquestionably have been a general 
break to Roosevelt. After this decision, the last hope 
of the Roosevelt forces that a sufficient number of the 
Taft delegates would refuse to stand by the decision 
of the National Committee came to an end. 

An analysis of the vote is interesting. Nearly half 
the Taft delegates came from states which could not 
be expected to give Republican votes in the electoral 
college. Roosevelt had 408 votes from definitely Repub- 
lican states, as compared with Taft's 270 votes from 
similar states. 

Late on Monday night of the convention, and on 
each night during the convention, there was a meeting 



360 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of the Roosevelt delegates. It was at these meetings 
that the Third Party Movement was born. At the 
meeting on Monday evening, Governor Johnson of 
California, in a masterful oration, asked the delegates 
to stand back of Roosevelt, to refuse to abide by the 
results of theft and to follow Roosevelt, bolt or no bolt. 
The appeal was greeted with terrific applause, and 
from that moment the chief difficulty that the leaders 
had with the majority of the Roosevelt delegates was 
to compel them to remain in the convention to carry 
out the program determined upon. That program was 
to place on the record of the convention motion after 
motion in which the necessity for the opposition forces 
to count the seventy-two delegates whose seats were 
contested was made manifest and then, when the time 
came for the nominations, to refuse to take part, to vote 
or to be bound by the proceedings. 

This program was carried out. On Saturday, when 
the nominations for Presidential candidates were reached, 
all but 107 Roosevelt men, acting under a direct request 
from Roosevelt, refused to vote. The 107 who did vote 
represented those who favored Roosevelt but who had 
not as yet made up their minds to leave the party. 
The President was renominated by 561 votes, or 21 
more than the necessary majority. 

One always-to-be-remembered incident occurred 
during the roll-call for the nomination for President. 
When Massachusetts was reached, the chairman of 
the delegation announced that the state cast eighteen 
votes for Taft and that eighteen declined to vote. Imme- 
diately there was a challenge and a call for a poll of the 
delegation, so the names were called. The first name 
was that of a delegate at large, a Mr. Fosdick. He 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 361 

said, "Present, but I refuse to vote." Everyone cheered 
and Mr. Root banged for order. When he got it, he 
came to the front of the platform and called out, "You 
have been sent here by your state to vote. If you refuse 
to do your duty, your alternate will be called upon." 
This had not been done in other delegations, but the 
Massachusetts delegation was peculiar in that the 
alternates, by a freak of the primary elections, were 
Taft men. The name of Fosdick was called again. He 
cried out, "No man on God's earth can make me vote 
in this convention." Whereupon Root called his alter- 
nate. This was done in the other Massachusetts cases 
and two alternates thus cast their votes for the President. 
The howl of derision and hate which greeted the announce- 
ment has never, I believe, been equalled in any great 
public gathering of representative Americans. The 
chairman announced that thereafter the alternates 
would not be called upon. It was the final exhibition 
of the steam roller. 

It has never been clear to me why this step was 
taken. The two votes were not necessary to insure 
Taft's nomination, while the action came very nearly 
costing the President the votes of several delegates 
committed to his candidacy. 

The decision given by Victor Rosewater that he 
had no power to go back of the temporary roll of delegates 
and exclude from the temporary organization of the 
convention delegates whose seats were contested, was, 
I believe, correct. The subsequent decision that the 
contested delegates, after the temporary organization 
of the convention, could vote on their own cases and the 
cases of other contested delegates, was, also, I believe, 
legally correct. Any other rule might permit a minority 



362 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

to be turned into a majority by the simple process of 
filing a sufficient number of contests with the National 
Committee. The real issue raised by the action of the 
conservatives at Chicago in 1912 was not whether the 
decisions of the presiding officer were legally correct. 
The issue was much more fundamental. In the light 
of the facts, no one can seriously contend that the 
National Committee had judicially determined the con- 
tests. Whatever the merits of those contests, the majority 
of the National Committee voted for their political 
friends. The argument to justify Roosevelt's opponents 
must always be that he had organized a temporary 
majority for the purpose of overthrowing the funda- 
mental principles on which the party was founded and 
always had been maintained; that in effect he stood 
for revolution, and that to prevent the destruction 
of the party, the minority were justified in going to the 
lengths they did to preserve their legal control over 
the organization. 

Those who believe that the conservatives were 
wrong in their conception of what the Republican party 
historically stood for and in their estimate of what 
Roosevelt was trying to do, may at this time admit 
that, believing as they did, the conservatives had an 
arguable excuse for standing by the determinations 
of the National Committee. On the other hand, the 
most conservative member of the Republican party 
should in all fairness admit that Roosevelt and his 
adherents believed, and had much cause for their belief, 
that the decisions of the National Committee repre- 
sented a deliberate attempt on the part of the minority 
to deprive the progressive forces of a victory which 
they had fairly won, and that this being their belief, 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 363 

they were justified in withdrawing and establishing 
a new party. 

As for the convention, there will always be one 
scene that those who witnessed it will never forget. 
Throughout the early days of the convention feeling 
ran high. The fear of riot was not an idle fear. There 
were minutes when it seemed that only the clear-cut 
decisive manner and commanding personality of Root 
prevented an outbreak. When the contests over the 
disputed seats were taken up, the delegates were tired 
and mad. In the debates over the first cases, the speakers 
on either side were interrupted by angry denials of 
their assertions. The first cases went, of course, against 
the Roosevelt forces. And yet, among those forces 
there was a general feeling that a sufficient number 
of the Taft men would refuse to stand by the decision 
to seat the two Taft delegates from San Francisco in 
defiance of the state primary law. Everyone recognized 
that if Roosevelt could not win in this contest, he could 
not win in any of the others, and that Taft would be 
nominated. When the result was announced, for an 
instant the Roosevelt delegates remained seated and 
silent while their opponents cheered, though rather 
mechanically. And then, as one man, the Roosevelt 
followers arose and cheered. I can see now the look 
of astonishment on the faces of their opponents, and 
yet the cheering was perfectly spontaneous. The sense 
of relief was universal. The long strain was over. We 
had lost. Roosevelt would not be nominated by the 
Republican party, but we were through with the Repub- 
lican party as controlled. We would go out and found 
a new party and make a great fight. 

From that moment the whole atmosphere of the 



364 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

convention changed. All tension disappeared. The 
Roosevelt supporters thereafter refrained from demand- 
ing roll-calls and refused to take any part in the pro- 
ceedings. They became mere spectators at a show, 
and frequently got a good deal of amusement out of 
the exhibition. The speakers' stand was at the end 
of a raised gangway which ran out from the main plat- 
form. One eminent statesman had the misfortune 
of being built on the lines of a fat puddle-duck. As 
he waddled out on the gangplank, the illusion that he 
had web feet and would quack was universal. The 
audience howled with a delight which was still further 
increased by his evident wrath at their mirth. The 
toot-toots and the choo-choos in imitation of a steam 
roller sounded everywhere. One delegate jumped on a 
chair, crying "Mr. Chairman, I desire to raise a point 
of order." When, after several minutes, quiet was 
restored, he said, "Mr. Chairman, my point of order 
is that the steam roller is exceeding its speed limit." 
And the chairman, having a sense of humor, declared 
the point well taken. 

When it became evident by the roll-calls on the 
seating of the contested Taft delegates that the conser- 
vatives would retain control of the national organi- 
zation of the Republican party, Orchestra Hall, a large 
hall on Michigan Avenue, a few blocks north of the 
Congress Hotel, was secured for a meeting. After the 
nomination of President Taft was announced, a great 
crowd began to gather in front of the hall. When the 
doors were opened, all the unreserved seats were imme- 
diately filled, and shortly after the adjournment of the 
Republican Convention a great majority of the Roose- 
velt delegates filled the reserved seats. 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 365 

The meeting was presided over by Governor John- 
son. It was called as a mass meeting to nominate Roose- 
velt for the Presidency. To all intents and purposes 
this program was carried out, though the resolution 
nominating Roosevelt was never formally passed. After 
a speech by Prendergast of New York City, I was called 
upon, and had only said a few words when Roosevelt 
came in. Thereafter speeches, resolutions, and every- 
thing else was forgotten in the desire to hear from the 
leader. He said that the time had come when not only 
all men who believed in progressive principles, but 
all men who believed in elementary maxims of public 
and private morality which must underlie every form 
of successful free government, should join in our move- 
ment. He asked us to go to our several homes, to find 
out the sentiment of the people, and to come together 
again, to nominate for the Presidency a progressive 
candidate on a progressive platform. "If you wish me 
to make the fight," he said, "I will make it, even if 
only one state should support me. The only condition 
I impose is that you shall feel entirely free, when you 
come together, to substitute any other man in my place, 
if you deem it better for the movement, and in such 
case, I will give him my heartiest support. " 

On Sunday morning, after the meeting in Orchestra 
Hall, a conference of progressives was held. It was 
notable for the very eloquent reading of the twenty- 
third Psalm by a colored clergyman present, for a clear- 
cut address by James R. Garfield, and for an earnest 
appeal from Governor Johnson. In the course of this 
appeal, the Governor said: "There have been times 
during the strain and stress of the past week when 
those of us who have been fighting at his side have 



366 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

expressed our indignation in language not fit for publi- 
cation. But during all that time, he has never lost his 
serenity and he has never lost his fighting spirit. He has 
the courage to go on always fighting for the right. For 
the love of God, gentlemen, can't we have that type 
of courage?" 

Every word of this was true. Roosevelt, through 
the turmoil of those days and nights, never lost control 
of his temper but once, and that was only for a few 
moments when the report reached him concerning 
the rules adopted by the Credentials Committee. He 
never lost his fighting spirit; nine-tenths of the time 
he was irrespressibly cheerful. I do not wish to give 
the impression that he was not thoroughly aroused — ■ 
more aroused, perhaps, than at any other time in his 
life. All that was best in him and his keen sense of 
justice and fair play rose against what we all regarded 
as a deliberate theft. To lie quietly down and submit 
was for him a moral impossibility. But he never for a 
moment judged harshly those who, when the break 
came, ceased to follow him. 

One of the finest things I have ever witnessed was 
the scene in the inside room of his suite when Governor 
Hadley came to bid him good-bye. The able and yet 
dignified manner in which Hadley had led the debates 
over the contested seats before the convention, combined 
with his fine, clear-cut, self-contained personality, had 
made him deservedly popular — so popular, indeed, that 
at one time, for twenty minutes, the Roosevelt delegates 
had cheered him, until a young woman in the gallery, 
with a picture of Roosevelt, turned the tide of the demon- 
stration. From that moment the great majority of the 
Roosevelt delegates were possessed with the fear that 



THE FIGHT FOR THE NOMINATION 367 

the Taft forces would offer the nomination to Hadley 
and that he would accept it. When the break came 
it was understood that the Governor Would not follow 
Roosevelt out of the Republican party. Feeling ran high. 
There was nothing but fierce anger at anyone who having 
been a leader now hesitated. 

And so, when the Governor came to say good-bye, 
the others present, with one or two exceptions, stood 
like graven images. Not so Roosevelt. He greeted the 
Governor, took him aside, talked with him privately, 
and bade him farewell. There was not a trace of resent- 
ment in his manner, and I do not think he felt resent- 
ment. When Hadley had gone, Roosevelt turned to 
the others and said, "He will not be with us, but we 
must not blame him." And so it was with any of his 
other supporters who felt that they could not follow 
him out of the Republican party. While the majority 
could not forgive these men for what they regarded as 
desertion at a critical time, Roosevelt was always able 
to place himself in the other man's position, to realize 
the political difficulties arising out of peculiar conditions 
in the man's own state, or to make allowances for the 
influences of association and temperament. 



CHAPTER XXIV 

The Founder of a New Party 

THE decision to form an independent party was 
made by Roosevelt, and by no one else. From 
many points of view, it was the most important 
decision of his life. There is probably no other action of 
his which has been the subject of so much discussion, not 
merely between friends and opponents, but among 
those who at various periods of his career have been 
his closest associates. Time has served to remove much 
of the bitterness engendered by the fierce political cam- 
paign that followed and the overwhelming defeat of 
the Republican party, but has not settled differences 
of opinion as to the wisdom of his action. 

He did not form the Progressive party to make 
himself President. I believe Roosevelt was the only 
man in Chicago, at least that he was among the very 
few, who grasped the bearing of his decision. The defeat 
of the Republican party in the coming November was a 
certainty, and this defeat, had he retained his connection 
with the Republican party, would have insured his 
nomination at the next Presidential election. All he 
had to do was to accept his defeat in the convention, 
tell his followers that he, personally, would vote for 
the Republican candidate, and that they must do what 
seemed to them best; and then quietly return to Oyster 
Bay, taking little or no part in the campaign. At the 
time the decision to form a third party was made, he 
stated that if his sole object was to be President again, 

(368) 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 369 

the course indicated was the course which reason dictated 
that he should pursue. 

But while Roosevelt wanted to be President, his 
desire for a third term was not, as we have seen, the 
dominant motive which led him to become a candidate 
for the Republican nomination. No one can understand 
and rightly judge his political actions who does not 
realize that he was always more interested in the message 
that he was delivering than in his own political fortunes. 
The main cause of his decision is found in the statement 
which he made to a small group who had, from the start 
of the contest, been closely associated with him: "If 
we form a third party and go out and fight for better 
social conditions in this country, we will accomplish 
more in three months than could be accomplished, 
under ordinary conditions in a dozen years." 

In stating the main cause which led Roosevelt to 
create the Progressive party, other influences which had 
their effect on his actions should not be wholly neglected. 
He was not a man to sit quietly under what he regarded 
as an injustice. That he had fairly won the nomination, 
he never doubted for a moment. As I have already 
stated, his sense of justice made it morally impossible 
for him to submit to injustice. Besides which he was 
mad, mad clean through, and did not regret at all the 
opportunity which the campaign gave him to speak 
plainly the truth as he saw it. 

And there was another reason. For years an ever- 
increasing number of earnest men and women had 
striven to call to the attention of the great mass of 
Americans certain evils in our political, social and eco- 
nomic system. No one knew more fully or sympathized 
more keenly with that group, of whom men like Raymond 

24 



370 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Robbins and Gifford Pinchot, and women like Jane 
Addams, are types. The fighter against political graft, 
the social worker, the man who, far from being a socialist, 
sees the danger of permitting the real injustices of existing 
conditions to continue without attempted amelioration — 
these he knew looked to him as the one man able to 
inspire the country with something of their own spirit 
and viewpo-int; and the fact that they so looked and 
that he owed much to them for the inspiration they had 
given him necessarily had its influence on his decision. 

The one thing which had no influence was his desire 
to be President. The Progressive party, so far as he was 
concerned, was founded and carried on, not to put 
him in the White House, but to produce those changes 
in the machinery of government which would give the 
people more direct control over their state and national 
governments, to make it impossible for small groups 
to override the will of the people, and to bring forward 
a definite constructive program of social and economic 
reform. If by fraud he was to be prevented from breaking 
the hold of the ultra-conservatives on the Republican 
party, then he would found a party that would be at 
once a federal and a progressive party. 

The first National Convention of the new party 
met in Chicago on Monday, August 5, 1912. Roosevelt 
came again to the city and occupied the same personal 
headquarters that he had occupied during the exciting 
days of the Republican Convention. Thus, after a short 
period of six weeks, the crowds, the excitement, the bands 
were all back again; and again great crowds filled the 
Coliseum. But here the similarity between the two 
conventions ended. The Republican Convention was 
an arena in which two bitterly antagonistic factions 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 371 

struggled for the mastery. The Progressive Convention 
was not a political convention at all. At least it was 
not like any other political convention that had ever 
been held. It was a mass meeting of men — also of 
women — starting out on a crusade. On the first day 
after the opening formalities, ex-Senator Albert W. 
Beveridge, of Indiana, delivered an address in which 
he performed the difficult task of putting into words 
the ideals and aspirations of the new party. The address 
was a great physical, intellectual and oratorical effort, 
and at the end he was greeted with the great ovation 
which he deserved. But the proof that he had under- 
stood the real spirit of his audience came after the applause 
had finally died down. Someone started to sing the 
"Battle Hymn of the Republic." With one accord 
the great audience joined in the immortal words of the 
opening stanza: 

He is trampling out the vintage where the grapes of 

wrath are stored. 
He has loosed the fateful lightning of His terrible, 

swift sword. 
His truth is marching on. 

From that moment, throughout the remaining two 
sessions of the convention, it was to all intents and 
purposes a religious gathering. 

On the second day, Tuesday, Roosevelt appeared 
before the delegates. He was cheered for fifty-five 
minutes before he was permitted to proceed with his 
address. His speech, which he entitled, "A Confession 
of Faith," is perhaps the most complete expression of 
his political ideals on domestic questions which he 
ever made. Mr. Edwin H. Abbott, who was present, 
and kept a record, states that he was interrupted by 



372 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

general hand-clapping and cheers no less than one 
hundred and forty-five times. The applause was essen- 
tially the applause of assent. We may doubt whether 
any other public man has ever addressed so large and 
so intelligent an audience with whom he was so com- 
pletely in accord. 

The real work of the convention was done by the 
Committee on Rules, the Committee on Credentials 
and the Resolutions or Platform Committee. The 
members of all these committees were in constant com- 
munication with Roosevelt, and the fact that their 
reports were unanimously and enthusiastically adopted 
by the convention is proof of the skill with which he 
adjusted differences. For there were serious differences 
of opinion as to policy. Perhaps never before had there 
been gathered together so large a group of men so few 
of whom were trained to give up the lesser for the greater 
aim. It was inevitable that this should be so from the 
very nature of the Progressive movement. In spite 
of the desire to accomplish a practical aim — the election 
of a candidate for the Presidency — and the almost 
complete absence of personal antagonism, I can conceive 
of no one but Roosevelt who could have produced not 
merely harmony of formal action but that harmony 
which creates enthusiasm because of the general belief 
that the right decisions have been made. 

The question which presented the greatest single 
difficulty arose over the admission of the colored delegates 
from the South. In many of the Southern states it was 
impossible to expect the formation of a political party 
which would contain the best of the whites if the delegates 
from the South were to be colored persons. Roosevelt 
believed with the late Henry Ward Beecher that all 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 373 

measures for the negro, in order to be permanently 
useful, must have the cordial consent of the best repre- 
sentatives of the white citizens among whom they live. 
Furthermore, he saw that the real hope for the political 
recognition of the negro in the South was to build up 
in opposition to the Democratic party another party 
controlled by whites. He therefore thought that the 
admission of negro delegates from a state should depend 
on the consent of the white Progressives in that state. 
There was a large element in the convention who believed 
that the party should disregard what they looked upon 
as an unchristian prejudice against the negro, even 
though the effect of such action, so far from producing 
political equality between the races, would merely 
end all hope of the formation of a party in the South 
which could contest elections with the Democratic 
party with any hope of success. 

The matter came to an issue in several contests 
before the Credentials Committee, but Roosevelt suc- 
ceeded in convincing nearly every member of the con- 
vention, white and black alike, that his theory of the way 
to deal with the vexed question was correct. 

There were of course differences innumerable over 
the various planks in the platform, many of which I, 
as chairman of the Resolutions Committee, had to get 
Roosevelt to iron out. On Monday, the first day of the 
convention, the Resolutions Committee was appointed. 
It met that evening and, as is usual, delegated to a 
sub-committee the task of hearing proposals by delegates 
and preparing a preliminary draft. A tentative draft 
of a platform had been prepared by a committee 
appointed some week before, consisting of Chester A. 
Rowell of California, Gifford Pinchot and myself, to 



374 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

whom were subsequently added Charles H. McCarthy, 
who had prepared the LaFollette Platform presented 
at the Republican Convention, and Dean George W. 
Kirch wey of the Columbia Law School. The sub- 
committee worked practically all of Monday night and 
all day Tuesday going over, changing, adding to and 
improving this tentative draft. 

Late on Tuesday afternoon the preliminary committee 
made its report and the general committee then began 
a detailed examination and discussion of each plank, 
which lasted throughout the night, and, indeied, until 
within a few minutes before the platform was reported 
late Wednesday afternoon, to the convention. Should 
or should we not have a plank favoring prohibition, 
or the single tax, or the recall of judges? How should 
the planks dealing with the Sherman Anti-Trust Law, 
the control of big business and the plank on foreign 
commerce be worded? Many of the questions raised 
were in fact of great practical importance, but often 
the longest discussions and the most feeling were over 
matters which would have seemed less important at a less 
exciting time. 

Throughout Tuesday night and Wednesday morning 
rumors would get out of the committee that a particular 
plank had been included or left out. When this occurred, 
inevitably some important and over-wrought leader 
would promptly lose his head and rush to Roosevelt 
to protest. I remember that when we were going 
over with Roosevelt the planks of the platform, two 
delegates, whom we may call Mr. A. and Mr. B., who 
were temporarily on less than speaking terms, differed 
strongly on the wording of a particular plank — though 
the differences did not seem to the rest of us very vital. 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 375 

Roosevelt had incarcerated one of the disputants in 
one anteroom and the other in another anteroom, 
passing back and forth between them, trying to straighten 
out the difference. When all else failed, he ordered food 
for Mr. A. When that statesman had been refreshed, 
all difficulties disappeared. 

Again, at the very moment when the delegates to 
the convention were marching around the Coliseum 
in the usual demonstration, and were breaking all records 
in both the volume and duration of their noise, one 
of the leaders was threatening to desert, and was advising 
Colonel Roosevelt not to accept the nomination because 
of irreconcilable platform differences, while at the same 
time it seemed almost hopeless to avoid a serious situa- 
tion in respect to the vice-presidential nomination. 
The very moment of most vociferous triumph outside 
was the moment of most critical doubt inside. It is 
the opinion of no less competent an observer than Chester 
A. Rowell, the California leader, that "only the tact- 
fulness, courage, and steady-headedness of Colonel 
Roosevelt prevented a smash-up." Of course there was 
nothing the matter with the others except hysteria, 
induced by overwork and loss of sleep. But Roosevelt, 
who had worked harder and slept less than any of them, 
kept also the coolest head. 

In spite of all the excitement among the leaders 
and all the arguments and differences of opinion among 
the members of the Resolutions Committee, the final 
result met with universal approval. Roosevelt, by 
the exercise of his infinite patience and tact, and also 
by his intuitive knowledge of when to use the power 
of his personality to insist on a definite decision, had 
secured exactly the platform he desired. 



376 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Perhaps to the statement that everyone was satisfied, 
one temporary exception should be made. Just before 
proceeding to the convention to report the platform, 
Roosevelt sent word that he desired to meet all the 
members of the committee personally. As we filed into 
his reception room, one enthusiastic advocate of pro- 
hibition said to me, "I intend to carry my fight for the 
insertion of a plank on prohibition to the floor of the 
convention." The subject was charged with dynamite, 
and it was important that my friend be dissuaded from 
carrying out his intention. As chairman, I was leading 
the members of the committee. As we came into the 
room, Roosevelt was on the far side. Crossing quickly, 
I told him the situation. How he succeeded in sepa- 
rating my friend from the other members and getting 
us all out of the room, while detaining him, I have never 
known. Inside of three minutes my friend followed us 
out. He was literally bursting with pride. "Well?" 
I said to him. "It is all right," he replied, "I suggested 
to Colonel Roosevelt that under all the circumstances, 
I was justified in not bringing the matter of prohibition 
before the convention." 

The platform contained planks advocating direct 
primaries, nation-wide 'Presidential preference primaries, 
the direct election of United States Senators, and the 
short ballot, together with the initiative, referendum 
and recall in the states. There were also planks for 
the encouragement, as well as the control of business, 
planks dealing with internal improvements and the 
development of the natural resources of the nation, 
as well as planks on the tariff, civil service reform, the 
exclusion of federal office-holders from party conventions 
and the publicity and limitation of campaign funds. 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 377 

In international matters the platform anticipated an 
issue of the present day by advocating an international 
agreement limiting the size of naval forces, and, pending 
such agreement, the maintenance of a policy of building 
two battleships a year. 

But the reason why the platform of the first Pro- 
gressive Convention will always remain one of the 
notable documents of our history is that it contained 
a concrete constructive program for the improvement 
of social and industrial conditions. It specifically 
declared in favor of workmen's compensation laws 
and laws providing for insurance against sickness and 
unemployment, the prohibition of child labor, minimum 
wage standards for working women, minimum safety 
and health standards for the various occupations, the 
general prohibition of night work for women, the estab- 
lishment of an eight-hour day for women and young 
persons, one day's rest in seven for all wage workers, 
and an eight-hour day in continuous twenty-four-hour 
industries. 

As Jane Addams, the head of Hull House, said 
in her address before the convention, seconding Roose- 
velt's nomination for the Presidency: "I second the 
nomination of Theodore Roosevelt because he is one of 
the few men in our public life who has been responsive to 
modern movement. Because of that, because the program 
will need a leader of invincible courage, of open mind, of 
democratic sympathies — one endowed with power to 
interpret the common man and to identify himself with 
the common lot, I heartily second the nomination." 

On Wednesday, the last day of the convention, 
Roosevelt was nominated by acclamation. When nom- 
inations for Vice-President were reached, Mr. Parker 



378 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

of Louisiana, and Judge Lindsey, of Colorado, who 
had both been spoken of for the nomination, respectively 
moved and seconded the nomination of Governor John- 
son of California, who unquestionably was the choice 
of the great majority of the delegates. Other speeches 
were made by Garfield, Pinchot, Landis, Robbins, 
Versey, Flinn and a colored delegate, Clede, and the 
nomination was made unanimous. Roosevelt and 
Johnson were escorted to the platform over which was 
hung in large letters, Kipling's verse: 

For there is neither East nor West, 

Border nor breed nor birth. 
When two strong men stand face to face, 

Though they come from the ends of the earth. 

Behind were hung portraits of Washington, Jefferson 
and Lincoln — on one side that of Jackson, and on the 
other that of Hamilton. 

Roosevelt and Johnson each addressed the con- 
vention, the main burden of each speech being the 
speaker's appreciation of the other man. After which 
the delegates stood and, with the great audience, sang 
in chorus, as the trombones sounded "Old Hundred," 
the words, "Praise God from whom all blessings flow." 

The campaign that followed was, on the part of 
the Progressives, marked at once by great enthusiasm 
and deep earnestness. The religious fervor which was a 
marked characteristic of the convention spread to 
Progressives in all parts of the country. The singing 
of "Onward, Christian Soldiers," at every campaign 
meeting was not an irreligious use of a sacred hymn, 
but a natural expression of the real spirit of the audience. 
For most of us who took part in the speaking it was 
a novel, and for all the speakers a wonderfully inspiring, 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 379 

experience. Roosevelt, in spite of what he had passed 
through during the previous five months, threw himself 
into the campaign with unabated energy. In early 
September he was in New England, after which he 
made a tour as far as the Pacific coast and the extreme 
southwest, returning to New York through the Southern 
states, a four-weeks' trip of over ten thousand miles, in 
which he made daily one or more long speeches and many 
shorter addresses. Always he spoke on Progressive 
principles and always to great crowds. 

The nomination of Woodrow Wilson by the Demo- 
crats made the task of attracting Democrats with pro- 
gressive sympathies into the new party not only much 
more difficult than it might have been had another 
nominee been chosen, but practically impossible. Though 
charges of fraud and bitter personal feeling had been 
absent from the Democratic Convention, there had 
been the same struggle between the conservative and 
radical elements of the party as in the Republican Con- 
vention. But in the case of the Democratic Convention, 
the leader of what we may call the intellectual radicals 
of his party had been nominated. As Governor of New 
Jersey there was a record of progressive laws to his 
credit. 

Roosevelt believed and tried to show that the Demo- 
cratic party was as much under the control of the "invis- 
ible government," of which Beveridge had spoken 
in his speech before the Progressive Convention, as the 
Republican. But the great bulk of the Democrats 
with progressive tendencies were not convinced, or at 
least had sufficient faith in Wilson to believe that, if 
elected President, he could break the "invisible control" 
of the special interests. The contest for the election, 



380 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

therefore, soon narrowed itself to a contest between 
Woodrow Wilson, holding the normal Democratic vote, 
and Roosevelt, who had behind him a large majority 
of the Republicans. He could not, however, command 
anything approaching the full Republican strength. 
Such a contest, in view of the relative numerical 
strengths of the Republican and Democratic parties 
prior to the formation of the third party, could 
only end in one way — the election of the Democratic 
candidate. 

It was planned to follow his far Western trip by a 
second one of over two weeks through the Middle West, 
after which there was to be a short campaign in Penn- 
sylvania and a more extended trip through New York 
State, to begin with an address in Madison Square 
Garden on October 26th. He was only destined to 
carry out a part of this program. On October 7th he 
left New York, and on the 14th was in Milwaukee, 
where he was scheduled to speak at the Auditorium. 
He had entered an automobile in front of the Gilpatrick 
Hotel to go to the Auditorium, and had turned to take 
his seat, when he was shot by a man named John Schrank, 
a resident of New York. The ball struck an inch to the 
right and an inch below the right nipple, fractured the 
fourth rib and ranged upward and inward four inches in 
the chest wall, but did not puncture the lung cavity. 
Had it not been deflected upwards by an eye-glass 
case and the folded manuscript of the speech in his 
pocket, the shot would undoubtedly have proved fatal. 
Schrank was prevented from firing a second shot by the 
quickness of thought and action displayed by Mr. 
Elbert Martin, one of Roosevelt's secretaries. Roose- 
velt's first thought was to save his assailant from bodily 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 381 

injury. When Schrank was brought before him, all he 
said was, "Don't hurt the poor creature." 

On arriving at the Auditorium, though physicians 
warned him that he was seriously, perhaps fatally, 
wounded, he insisted on delivering his prepared address. 
If he lacked any of his usual vigor, and he certainly 
felt the strain before the speech was over, the audience 
did not notice it. The address concluded, he placed 
himself in the hands of the doctors. After an X-ray 
examination, it was decided that he should be taken 
to the Mercy Hospital, in Chicago. He spent the 
remainder of the night in his car and arrived in Chicago 
Tuesday morning, where he was soon joined by Mrs. 
Roosevelt, who had been hastily summoned from New 
York. 

It developed that Schrank was a person whose weak 
mind had been excited by reading the violent partisan 
attacks of the opposition papers, especially the assertions 
repeatedly made that if Roosevelt were elected he would 
try to make himself a dictator, that his election would 
be the end of the Republic, and that it would necessarily 
mean a "bloody revolution" within a few years. 

The tragedy so narrowly averted, and his magnificent 
courage in going on with the address made a great impres- 
sion on the country and stilled for the time being all 
or nearly all extreme partisan attacks. Governor Wilson 
instantly announced that in view of his political adver- 
sary's disablement, he would withdraw from further 
campaigning. To this, however, Roosevelt strongly 
objected, saying that "the welfare of any one man in 
this fight is wholly immaterial, compared to the great 
and fundamental issues involved." He further pointed 
out that there were hundreds of other men preaching 



382 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the doctrines that he had been preaching, and that so 
far as his opponents were concerned, "whatever could 
with truth and propriety have been said against me and 
my cause before I was shot can, with equal truth and 
equal propriety, be said against me now, and it should 
be so said; and the things that can not be said now are 
merely the things that ought not to have been said before. 
This is not a contest about any man; it is a contest 
concerning principles." 

After six days in the Mercy Hospital, he was so 
far improved that he was allowed to take the journey 
to Oyster Bay, and on October 30th, though as a matter 
of fact very far from being fully recovered, he addressed 
sixteen thousand persons in Madison Square Garden. 
It is almost superfluous to add that he received an 
ovation which in its manifestation of heartfelt personal 
affection and admiration has never been equalled. As 
one paper, bitterly opposed to him politically, said, 
speaking of the meeting: "It had all loyalty to a cause 
and devotion to an individual rolled into one and offered 
to the man whom they regarded as the personification 
of that cause." His speech was marked by calmness, 
poise and a penetrating note of conviction and of duty. 
"I am glad beyond measure," he said, "that I am one 
of the many who in this fight have stood ready to spend 
and be spent, pledged to fight, while life lasts, the great 
fight for righteousness and for brotherhood and for 
the welfare of mankind." 

The election took place on November 5th. Of 
the 15,031,169 votes cast, Wilson received 6,286,214, 
Roosevelt, 4,126,020 and Taft 3,483,922, the remainder 
going to other candidates. Wilson had a plurality 
over Roosevelt of more than 2,000,000, but his total 



THE FOUNDER OF A NEW PARTY 383 

vote fell short of the combined vote for all other can- 
didates by 2,458,741 votes, and the combined vote for 
Roosevelt and Taft exceeded Wilson's vote by 1,323,728. 

On the other hand, the result in the Electoral College 
and in Congress was an overwhelming triumph for the 
Democratic party. Roosevelt carried Pennsylvania, 
Michigan, Missouri, South Dakota, and Washington, 
and secured eleven of the thirteen electoral votes from 
California, a total of eighty-eight votes in all. Taft 
carried Vermont and Utah, securing eight votes. Wilson 
secured the remaining 435 votes, the largest majority ever 
given in any Electoral College to any Presidential candi- 
date. The Democratic party obtained control of both 
branches of Congress. 

The story told by these figures was plain. Progressive 
principles had triumphed. A program of national pro- 
gressive legislation by the new Congress was assured. 
As Roosevelt himself had foretold, the campaign had 
done more towards bettering social conditions in three 
months than is often accomplished in a dozen years. 
But the Progressive party had failed to attract progressive 
members from among the Democrats. The Republican 
party had been split in two and the larger share had 
gone to the Progressives, but the Democratic party 
remained intact. Therefore, the moment the returns 
were analyzed, it was clear that unless Woodrow Wilson 
failed to carry out the progressive policies to which he 
was committed, thereby driving progressive Democrats 
into the Progressive party, in a short time either the 
Republican or the Progressive party would cease to exist. 



CHAPTER XXV 



Roosevelt the Naturalist* 



ON March 15, 1913, Roosevelt came to Phil- 
adelphia to deliver a Progressive party address. 
As usual, when in the city, he stayed with his 
friend Dr. J. William White. Consenting to make 
the address, he had remarked casually that it would 
give him an opportunity to consult with Witmer Stone, 
of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences. I 
was to preside at the Progressive meeting, and it was 
my duty to go to Dr. White's for the Colonel, and to 
bring him to the Academy of Music. 

Shortly before the hour fixed those in charge of the 
arrangements at the Academy telephoned that every 
seat was taken, and that large crowds on the outside 
were trying to get in. Outside of Dr. White's house a 
considerable number of people had assembled to see 
the Colonel come out. I was told that he was upstairs 
in the library, so upstairs I went. As I entered the room 
he waved his hand and motioned to a chair, saying: 
"I know you want me to go with you, but sit down a 
moment; to hear something about tree-toads will do 
you good." And then, for some ten or fifteen minutes, 
I listened to an animated discussion between the Colonel 
and Dr. Stone on questions of animal coloration. 

I had never seen him more animated in the most 



* I have no scientific knowledge of natural history and have therefore asked Dr. 

Witmer Stone, Curator of the Philadelphia Academy of Natural Sciences, to write the 

estimate of Roosevelt as a naturalist which appears in this chapter. 

W. D. L. 

(384) 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 385 

exciting political campaign, and soon the waiting audience 
at the Academy and the object of my visit passed from 
my mind, and the only thing that really interested me 
was how that tree-toad disappeared. Suddenly the 
discussion abruptly stopped. The Colonel turned to 
me saying, "Now, Dean, I am ready," and inside of ten 
minutes he stood before a great audience and plunged 
into an interesting discussion of Progressive principles. 
Nevertheless, I could not rid myself of the impression 
that the real thing that interested him in that visit 
to Philadelphia was his discussion with Dr. Stone. 
Natural history had for the time being triumphed over 
politics. 

It is difficult in these days to estimate a man's attain- 
ments as a "naturalist" because of the loose way in 
which the term is popularly used. Anyone who is inter- 
ested in natural history may pass for a naturalist, and 
if he be an entertaining speaker and possessed of some 
attractive lantern slides his reputation is established. 
The public seldom troubles itself to go further and to 
ascertain what actual scientific work he has done and 
whether or not it is a valuable addition to the fund of 
human knowledge. 

One of the surest indications of the spirit of the true 
naturalist in Theodore Roosevelt was, it seems to me, 
his full appreciation of this lack of discrimination on 
the part of the public and the capital that has been 
made out of it by those unscrupulous individuals for 
whom he coined the apt sobriquet of "nature fakirs." 
The faulty observations and false deductions of such 
writers aroused his greatest indignation, and again and 
again we find him demanding care and accuracy in 
observation as well as in the interpretation of obser- 

25 



386 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

vations, even though we lose thereby many of the spectac- 
ular features that a too vivid imagination or a looseness 
in regard to veracity may so easily impart. 

Colonel Roosevelt's ambition in early life was to 
become a naturalist of the type of Audubon, Wilson, 
Baird or Coues — an out-door student of birds and 
mammals; and upon entering Harvard he had about 
decided upon a scientific career. Here, however, he 
found that in university circles this side of natural 
history was looked upon with disfavor and actually 
discouraged. Natural science in the colleges had become 
purely a laboratory study centered about the microscope, 
and to emphasize the gulf that separated the exponents 
of science from the old-time "naturalist," such terms 
as "scientist" and "biologist" were coining into vogue. 
Nowadays the pendulum seems to be swinging back 
again and ere long, we trust, the study of the living 
animal will take a place in educational institutions 
side by side with the study of its embryonic development 
and the minute structure of its organs. The attitude 
of the scientific department at Harvard discouraged 
in young Roosevelt any further thought of science as a 
career, but his interest in out-door natural history 
suffered no check. He did, however, develop a prejudice 
against the so-called "closet" study of natural history 
which he maintained throughout his life. 

The gathering of information on the life-history 
of an animal is just as important as the study of its 
dead body, but the pursuit of this sort of knowledge 
is so intimately associated with the love of the chase 
and the enjoyment of out-door life, that it is too often 
overshadowed by them and lost sight of. There are 
game birds and game mammals which have been hunted 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 387 

for a century or more, yet their full life-histories are 
still to be recorded. Hunters have written volumes upon 
them but they have treated of the hunting rather than 
of the game. It was right here that Theodore Roosevelt 
made his greatest contributions to natural history. 
He recognized the incompleteness of the recorded life- 
histories of our larger animals and set about supplying 
what was lacking. Success in this quest always gave 
him as keen satisfaction as the securing of the trophies 
of the chase, and it will be noticed that in planning his 
hunting trips his thought was not of getting the largest 
amount of game but of hunting some different species of 
animal or one concerning which information was desired. 
It has been said of Colonel Roosevelt that when 
he hunted he knew what was not known about the 
animal that he sought. That is to say, he had read all 
that had been written about it and knew exactly what 
were the gaps in its life-history. Thus equipped he passed 
by such actions and habits as were already well known 
and was ever alert for opportunities to observe what 
had hitherto been unrecorded. The extent of his reading 
in natural history was extraordinary and his ability 
to retain in memory the major points of each author 
in such order as to be immediately available was still 
more remarkable. It is noticeable in his writings that 
he not infrequently fails to recall some unimportant 
name or incident or perhaps omits some of the initials 
of a man's name — details of paramount importance 
to the bibliographic mind, but of no real moment; and 
one wonders if his mind were not so trained as to discrim- 
inate between important and useless data, so that he 
did not lumber up the mental storehouse with an accu- 
mulation of the latter. 



388 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

His power of marshalling the facts gleaned in his 
reading was especially impressed upon me in listening 
to him outline the chapter on animal coloration which 
appeared later in "The Life-Histories of African Game 
Animals.' * He had apparently read every work on the 
subject, and without notes and following immediately 
upon an important discussion on an entirely different 
topic, he presented the subject in a masterly manner, 
referring with absolute accuracy now to the views of 
one author, now to those of another. 

In order to clearly understand Colonel Roosevelt's 
reasons for selecting the natural history of the large 
game animals as his speciality we must quote from his 
own statement: "Most big game hunters," he says, 
"never learn anything about the game except how to 
kill it; and most naturalists never observe it at all. 
Therefore a large amount of important and rather 
obvious facts remain unobserved or inaccurately observed 
until the species become extinct. What is most needed 
is not the ability to see what very few people can see, 
but to see what almost anyone can see, but nobody 
takes the trouble to look at. . . . The facts I saw and 
observed during our five weeks' hunt [for cougars] were 
obvious; they needed only the simplest powers of obser- 
vation and of deduction from observation. But nobody 
had hitherto shown or exercised these simple powers." 
This very fact, however, which Colonel Roosevelt men- 
tions with no little surprise would seem to emphasize 
the keenness of mind and perception and the determi- 
nation, preparedness and perseverance of the man who 
finally did make the observations. 

It must be clear to anyone who reads his accounts 
of wild animals that he possessed the most essential 




© Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

HUNTING IN THE ROCKIES 

Mr. Roosevelt on one of his later hunting trips in the Rocky Mountains 
where much big game fell to his accurate eye and steady hand. He was long 
famous in the West as one of the bravest, pluckiest hunters for big game in all 

that country. 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 389 

qualifications of the field naturalist to a marked degree — 
keenness of observation, clearness of mind, accuracy 
in deduction and absolute regard for truth; and though 
he almost never referred to himself as a naturalist he 
nevertheless early gained the goal of his youthful ambi- 
tion of becoming an out-door naturalist such as Audubon, 
Wilson or Coues. In 1907 no less an authority than 
Dr. C. Hart Merriam said: "Theodore Roosevelt is 
the world's authority on the big game mammals of 
North America. His writings are fuller and his obser- 
vations are more complete and accurate than those 
of any other man who has given the subject study." 

And recently Sir Harry Johnson, the famous English 
explorer and naturalist has written: "Theodore Roose- 
velt was not only a great naturalist himself, but he set 
the fashion in young America for preserving and studying 
fauna and flora until he had gone far to create a new 

phase of religion He was a field zoologist of the 

new school who studied wild life with unswerving accu- 
racy, seeking only to set forth the truth in real natural 
history." 

He not only did admirable constructive work but 
he took pains to expose and discredit the fabulous tales 
which had been associated with the histories of many 
of our large animals, stories which, originating in some 
unreliable narrative, had been copied from author to 
author until they gained a firm foothold in the literature 
of the day. If his observations differed from those of a 
fellow student for whose knowledge and attainments 
he had a high regard it made no difference so far as 
publishing his own experiences was concerned, but he 
always courteously called attention to the discrepancy 
and explained it on the grounds of individual peculiarity 



390 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

in habit, which in beast as well as in man is bound to 
be met with. When his attention was called to an obvious 
slip in one of his statements he at once admitted the 
error, but in matters of theory, so long as he regarded 
the facts as clearly supporting his views, he clung tena- 
ciously to his opinions and in practically every instance 
he has been supported by a large majority of other 
naturalists. 

In all his studies it was the habits of the animals 
which most appealed to him. He had little or no interest 
in the separation of a species into geographical varieties 
through the careful study of large series of specimens 
in the museum, though he was willing and anxious to 
secure the material, when necessary, upon which such 
studies might be carried on by those interested in that 
kind of work. He was, however, absolutely opposed to 
bringing these technical distinctions into semi-popular 
literature and giving them distinctive English names. 
He, for instance, objected strenuously to calling the 
northern race of the whiskey -jack or Canada jay, the 
"Alaskan jay," as if it were a distinct species, and 
said: "Give the Alaskan form a third Latin name, 
by all means, to distinguish him in writing treatises 
exclusively for specialists — if it gratifies them; but in 
books for general reading by intelligent men call it 
the whiskey-jack, mentioning only if necessary that the 
allusion is to the Alaskan form." 

This statement, strictly interpreted, is in line with 
his disregard for unessential matter in his reading, 
and so considered it has a large element of common 
sense even though it may shock the sensibilities of the 
systematic zoologist. Underlying it and many other 
similar statements, however, there is a decided contempt 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 391 

for what he, like many another out-door naturalist, 
regards as the useless multiplication of species. He 
seemed, for instance to think that because only two of 
our North American wolves had received distinctive 
vernacular names — the timber wolf and the coyote — 
that all individuals were referable to one or other of these 
two "species" and that the several geographic forms 
were easily disposed of between them. As a matter of 
fact, however, there are several perfectly distinct species, 
while the relationship of the numerous geographic 
forms is by no means an easy matter to settle. Such 
facts are brought out only by painstaking museum 
research and had he devoted his attention to this side 
of the study there is little doubt but that he would have 
been convinced that the problem is not one to be so 
easily disposed of. This rather hasty judgment of 
problems that must be considered from several points 
of view, and an occasional similar judgment of the 
merits of a writer from only a part of his writings, 
constituted the basis for one of the few criticisms that 
could be made of Colonel Roosevelt's natural history 
work. 

Everyone has of course his preferences, and while 
mammals and birds always appealed to Colonel Roose- 
velt, and even wild flowers shared his attention, he had 
no interest whatever in the lower forms of animal life. 
"I can no more explain," he writes, "why I do not care 
for that enormous brand of natural history which deals 
with the invertebrates than I can explain why I do not 
care for brandied peaches." And again, in criticising 
a work on African exploration because it treated at 
length the lesser forms of animal life at the expense of 
big game, he says: "Full knowledge of a new breed of 



392 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

rhinoceros or a full description of the life-history and 
characteristics of almost any kind of big game is worth 
more than any quantity of matter about new spiders 
and scorpions. ... It is only the pioneer hunter who can 
tell us all about the great beasts of the chase. It is a 
mistake to subordinate the greater to the lesser.'' He 
goes on to explain that the spiders and scorpions will 
remain long after the big game is exterminated, and may 
be studied and described by later explorers. While 
entomologists may not agree with him, there is here 
again much common sense in his argument. At the 
same time his frankly admitted preference for the study 
of big game animals doubtless had much to do with 
his statement, and what specialist does not place his 
own hobby before any other branch of research? 

Next to game animals, Colonel Roosevelt's chief 
interest was in birds; indeed his first natural history 
studies were in ornithology. At the age of fourteen 
he began collecting birds both at his home at Oyster 
Bay and in the North Woods, and he took lessons in 
taxidermy from the veteran John G. Bell, who had 
accompanied Audubon on his famous journey up the 
Missouri in 1843. While at Harvard Roosevelt became 
a member of the Nuttall Ornithological Club of Cam- 
bridge, attended the meetings regularly, and took an 
active part in the proceedings. The records of the club 
for January 28, 1872, mention a special discussion on 
the merits of "the so-called English sparrow" which 
had then but just become established in this country, 
and in this discussion Theodore Roosevelt was one of 
those who participated. Even before this, in 1871, 
he had published a little four-page pamphlet in con- 
junction with Henry D. Minot, another member of the 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 393 

Nuttall Club of about his own age, on the "Summer 
Birds of the Adirondack^," which is referred to in a con- 
temporary review as "a very acceptable list — the first 
known to us of the summer birds of this little explored 
region." The next year appeared a similar publicat'* 
"Notes on Some of the Birds of Oyster Bay, Long Island 

Later on such time as he was able to devot*- .al 

history was so taken up with his studies of f i? big game 
animals that he made but few contrib ■ ns to ornith- 
ology. His interest in birds still remained veen, however, 
and in a magazine article entitled, "Small Country 
Neighbors," he gives us a delightful account of the 
familiar bird-life of Long Island, about the White House 
at Washington and at Pine Knot, a small place that 
he had in Albemarle County, Virginia. In this sketch 
there are moreover several notes and observations of 
no little importance. His early publications and the 
broad general knowledge of birds that is evidenced by 
incidental mention in various of his later writings show 
conclusively that he could easily have taken a prominent 
place among the out-door ornithologists of America, 
had he chosen to make bird study a matter of major 
interest; but he felt that he should devote himself 
to a subject that was not only not so adequately supplied 
with competent students, but which appealed even 
more strongly to him, and in which, therefore, he could 
obtain greater results. 

That his interest in birds continued to be active 
and his knowledge of them kept pace with the literature, 
is shown by a letter, written the day before he died, to 
Captain William Beebe, in regard to the classification 
adopted in the latter's "Monograph of the Pheasants," 
a book of exactly the character that Colonel Roosevelt 



394 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

most admired in natural history publications, and the 
first volume of which he was engaged in reviewing. 
Incidentally it may be mentioned that he had read and 
digested the entire volume of some 250,000 words in 
the ten days preceding his death. 

3ring Colonel Roosevelt's contributions to 
nature seknce more in detail we have first his life his- 
tories of the larger game animals of America. His earlier 
writings on this subject, contained in the volumes 
entitled: "Hunting Trips of a Ranchman" (1883), 
"Ranch Life and the Hunting Trail" (1888), and "The 
Wilderness Hunter" (1893), partake more of the nature 
of hunting narratives, although they contain many 
original observations. In commenting upon them in 
later years the author says: "I vaguely supposed that 
the obvious facts [on the habits of the animals were 
known and let most of my opportunities pass by." In 
his later writings he pays increasing attention to the 
life-histories of the animals, often gleaning the important 
facts from his earlier experiences and incorporating 
them with new material so that they form the best 
accounts of such species as the white-tailed deer, mule 
deer, wapiti, prong-horned antelope, wolf, etc., that 
have been written. 

These sketches are contained in "The Deer Family," 
a volume of the "American Sportsman's Library" 
written by Colonel Roosevelt, T. S. VanDyke, D. G. 
Elliot and A. J. Stone; and in the volumes of the Boone 
and Crocket Club. Later still he made special trips to 
Colorado for bear and cougars and to the cane-brakes 
of the Gulf states for a little-known species of bear 
found only in that region. The results of these trips 
and others appeared first as magazine articles, while 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 395 

most of them were afterward collected together in the 
volumes entitled, "Outdoor Pastimes of an American 
Hunter" (1908) and "A Booklover's Holidays in the 
Open" (1916). 

The account of the cougar is especially noteworthy, 
for, as the author says: "No American beast has been 
the subject of so much loose writing or of such wild 
fables." Colonel Roosevelt took the greatest pains to 
secure all possible information about the animal at 
first hand and from reliable observers, and he weighs 
this against the various accounts that had been previously 
published, pointing out those which are reliable and 
exposing the improbable and impossible in others. 
In addition, measurements and weights were taken of 
every specimen, and the entire series of skulls was pre- 
served and presented to the U. S. National Museum. 
D. C. Hart Merriam in commenting upon these 
specimens says: "Your series is incomparably the 
largest, most complete and most valuable ever brought 
together from any single locality, and will be of inesti- 
mable value in determining the amount of individual 
variation." 

During the last year of his Presidential term Colonel 
Roosevelt began to plan for his trip to East Africa, a 
trip which naturally received wide publicity and which 
to many persons who knew him only in public office, 
was the first intimation of his interest in natural history. 
Many indeed refused to recognize any such interest, 
interpreting the whole expedition as a mere head-hunt- 
ing trip to this wild game paradise. As a matter of 
fact every effort was made to yield the greatest benefit 
to science. A corps of scientific men representing the 
Smithsonian Institution accouipanied the party and 



396 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

everyone was well read upon the zoology of the region, 
so that, as in Colonel Roosevelt's early hunting trips, 
they "knew what was not known" of the animals they 
were to hunt. Collections of the greatest value to science 
were secured by the expedition, all of which, with the 
exception of about a dozen trophies and a few specimens 
presented to other museums, are now preserved in the 
National Museum at Washington. 

Great additions to our knowledge of the African 
fauna and the problems of the distribution of life have 
resulted from a study of this material and from the 
recorded observations of the members of the party, 
while a host of hitherto undescribed species was dis- 
covered. Of course the other members of the party 
share with Colonel Roosevelt the credit for the success 
of the expedition, but a large part of it was due to his 
well conceived plan, his enthusiasm in carrying it out 
and his personal activity in the field in collecting both 
data and specimens. Owing to the prominence of the 
leader of the expedition the attention of many people 
was directed to the trip who had never before heard 
of a scientific exploring expedition or had the slightest 
conception of the need of specimens for the advancement 
of scientific knowledge. This led to some criticism from 
wholly unqualified sources, as to the folly of such an 
undertaking and the wantonness of killing wild animals, 
which was as unjust as it was deplorable. Many men 
who were unknown to the public at large had, it is true, 
gone to Africa solely for the killing of game for trophies 
without benefitting science in the least, and these had 
escaped all criticism, while this wholly justifiable expedi- 
tion for scientific research and the advancement of 
knowledge was held up to censure. 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 397 

As a matter of fact no hunter or naturalist had a 
greater regard for the preservation of wild life than 
Colonel Roosevelt — indeed, if I mistake not, the present 
wide use of the word "conservation" in this connection 
is due to him. He was likewise fully aware of the need 
of specimens for scientific research and also of the fact 
that the collecting of specimens for such a purpose 
never appreciably affected the abundance of any animal. 
To use his own words: "There should be no collecting 
excepting for an adequate and public purpose, and of 
species on the verge of extinction there should be no 
collecting at all; and purposeless slaughter committed 
under the pretense of 'collecting' should be rigorously 
punished. But, if these conditions be fulfilled, it is as 
necessary to collect animals for museum specimens 
as to kill sheep and chickens for food." Again, speaking 
of the white rhinoceros, he says: "Too little is known 
of these northern square-mouthed rhino for us to be 
sure that they are not lingering slowly toward extinction ; 
and lest this should be the case, we were not willing to 
kill any merely for trophies; while, on the other hand, 
we deemed it really important to get good groups for 
the National Museum in Washington and the American 
Museum in New York." 

In this connection it may be stated that when 
President, Colonel Roosevelt established our first 
National Bird Preserve, on Pelican Island, Florida, 
where the brown pelicans have ever since been able 
to breed absolutely unmolested; and before he left 
the executive office he had established no less than 
fifty-one of these reservations mainly on small islands 
which served as breeding grounds for various species 
of water birds, species which have thus been rescued 



398 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

from persecution and whose extinction would other- 
wise have ensued in the course of time. 

The literary results of the African expedition were 
two; first, the narrative: "African Game Trails," 
which is full of observations on the natural history 
of the country, as well as the details of the hunting 
and the experiences of the party; second: "Life His- 
tories of African Game Animals," to which Colonel 
Roosevelt contributed the life-histories, and Edmund 
Heller, one of the naturalists who accompanied him, 
the technical descriptions, etc., although the work of 
each was revised by the other so that the result is a 
joint product. In this work Colonel Roosevelt is at 
his best as an out-door naturalist and the accounts 
are probably the best that have ever been written of 
the larger mammals of Africa. It is today the standard 
work on the subject. 

In 1913 Colonel Roosevelt headed another expedition, 
in scope exactly like the African one, but this time to 
Brazil, while the naturalists who accompanied him 
represented the American Museum of Natural History 
of New York. This trip, ending in the geographical 
exploration which involved the voyage down the "River 
of Doubt," now the Rio Teodoro, was as productive 
as the other in the acquisition of valuable collections 
which have served as the basis of important contributions 
to faunal zoology. As the fauna of South America is 
notably poor in the larger mammalia, however, there 
was less opportunity for Colonel Roosevelt to contribute 
to the literature of the group which most interested 
him. His observations are all included in the volume, 
"Through the Brazilian Wilderness," which, though 
dealing mainly with the itinerary of the expedition, 



ROOSEVELT THE NATURALIST 399 

contains important contributions to the life histories 
of the jaguar, tapir, peccary, etc., and abundant comment 
on the bird-life for which Brazil is famous. 

Among the more general natural history problems, 
the theory of protective coloration was one that early 
attracted Colonel Roosevelt's attention; indeed he 
tells us that as early as 1872, when, as a college student, 
he accompanied his parents to Egypt, he made some 
observations along this line, and from that time on he 
was always alert for any incident that would throw 
additional light on the subject. The main point at issue 
was : To what extent does the coloration of an animal, by 
resembling the background against which it is seen, 
render it inconspicuous and thereby protect it from its 
enemies? There are a number of quite obvious cases 
both among birds and mammals, and especially among 
insects and reptiles; but there are also a host of cases 
in which coloration seems to offer no protection what- 
ever. Nevertheless certain writers have claimed that 
all forms of animals are concealingly colored and that 
this underlying principle is the explanation of the devel- 
opment of color in the animal kingdom. 

This view Colonel Roosevelt strenuously opposed, and 
from his wide and varied experiences, and with his mind 
ever keen for observations bearing on the subject, he was 
peculiarly well fitted for discussing it. His two leading 
contributions to the problem are a lengthy paper in the 
"Bulletin of the American Museum of Natural History" 
on "Revealing and Concealing Coloration in Birds and 
Mammals;" and a chapter in "Life Histories of African 
Game Animals," entitled "Concealing and Revealing 
Coloration and their Relation to Natural Selection." 
These are among the most important contributions to 



400 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the subject and embody Colonel Roosevelt's final views. 
Anyone, however, who reads his writings on natural 
history will find the subject cropping out at frequent 
intervals in almost every volume, so strongly did it 
appeal to him. 

This brief summary covers Colonel Roosevelt's main 
contributions to natural science but, greater than all 
of them, perhaps, should be rated his influence in 
developing the out-door natural history that he loved, 
in placing it on a higher plane and in preaching the 
doctrine of absolute accuracy. This will exert an influ- 
ence for many a year to come. When we read his natural 
history writings and realize the extent of his knowledge 
and the possibilities of the man in this field, one who 
knew nothing of his life might wonder that he did not 
publish more. But when we know what a many-sided 
man he was, how varied were his activities and how 
tremendous his responsibilities we marvel that he accom- 
plished so much. Those who are competent to judge, 
in reviewing his life-work, will realize that it was only 
the eminence of Roosevelt the statesman and the constant 
call to public service that obscured the reputation and 
checked the further development of Roosevelt the 
naturalist. 



CHAPTER XXVI 

The River of Doubt 

IN the winter of 1913 to 1914 Roosevelt took his 
trip through the heart of South America — the 
last of his adventures into the wilderness. The 
expedition had been originally suggested to him while 
he was still in the White House by Father Zahm, a 
Catholic priest with whom he was well acquainted. 
The African trip had prevented him from carrying 
out Father Zahm's suggestion immediately, but in 1913 
the opportunity at last presented itself. 

He was invited to address certain learned bodies 
in Argentina and Brazil and decided not to come home 
without first exploring the remote depths of the Bra- 
zilian wilderness. The American Museum of Natural 
History in New York was glad to send two naturalists, 
George K. Cherrie and Leo E. Miller, to accompany 
the expedition. Father Zahm was also to go, together 
with Kermit Roosevelt, Anthony Fiala, a former Arctic 
explorer, and Jacob Sigg, who was to act as the per- 
sonal attendant of Father Zahm. 

The object of the expedition was to secure animal 
and plant specimens from the central plateau of Brazil, 
which lies between the headwaters of the Amazon and 
Paraguay rivers. The explorers proposed originally to 
go up the Paraguay as far as possible, and from there 
to cross to one of the tributaries of the Amazon, and 
so to come down again to civilization. 

But when the Colonel reached Rio de Janeiro, the 

£6 (401) 



402 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Brazilian Minister of Foreign Affairs, Mr. Lauro Miiller, 
suggested a more serious enterprise. Through the great 
wilderness of western Brazil, known as the Matto Grosso, 
there flowed a river whose course and destination geog- 
raphers had never traced, and which they called the 
Rio da Duvida, the River of Doubt. Miiller suggested 
that Roosevelt should combine with Colonel Rondon, 
a famous Brazilian explorer, and that they should follow 
together the course of this stream, making natural 
history and geography the joint objects of their expedi- 
tion. To this proposal Roosevelt eagerly assented. 

After his speaking engagements had been fulfilled, 
he started, on December 9, 1913, up the Paraguay River 
from the little city of Asuncion, traveling on a gunboat- 
yacht which the President of Paraguay had courteously 
lent. For three days the boat steamed northward, cross- 
ing the tropic of Capricorn and passing on the east 
bank a fairly well settled country with occasional fruit 
orchards. On the west bank lay the swampy Chaco 
country which was as yet practically untouched by 
civilization. 

Often the boat stopped to take on provisions, and 
fish were caught. The most frequent kind of these 
was the piranha — a fish of terrible ferocity. They are 
comparatively small, not more than a foot or so in 
length, but are none the less formidable. Where they 
are numerous men and animals cannot safely enter 
the water, or even touch a part of their bodies to the 
surface without the risk of instant attack. If one fish 
attacks and draws blood, all of them are immediately 
excited to madness. A wounded man or animal in the 
water will attract them in large numbers and will inevi- 
tably be eaten alive unless he can escape within the first 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 403 

few seconds. Fortunately these piranhas are not dan- 
gerous in all places, and for that reason are not so much 
to be dreaded as are the man-eating crocodiles of the Nile. 

At Concepcion the boat was moored and the party 
walked through the town, which is inhabited by Para- 
guayan Christians who are totally different from the 
wild savages of the Chaco. The colonel of the garrison 
had prepared a reception for Roosevelt, and at the 
City Hall he addressed a friendly audience on the polit- 
ical ideas which were suggested to him by this visit 
to a country plagued by the revolutionary habit. 

On they went from Concepcion, up the Paraguay, 
passing a good many other large boats and arriving 
at last at the Brazilian line. Here Colonel Rondon 
and his associates met them. Rondon had spent twenty- 
four years in exploring the western highlands of Brazil, 
and knew them more thoroughly than any man living. 
He described the difficulties which they were to face — 
the danger from piranhas, pumas, snakes and other 
animals, but especially from venomous insects, and 
from sickness and accidents due to hard traveling. 

In company with Colonel Rondon 's party they went 
up the stream, traveling in two boats, and on December 
15th reached the town of Corumba. Here Cherrie and 
Mtiller, who had already collected some eight hundred 
specimens, were waiting to meet them. Two days later 
they started up the Taquary River — a tributary of the 
Paraguay — to visit the home of a hospitable ranchman. 

As they went slowly up the shallow river they saw 
many water-birds and quantities of caymans, which 
are not unlike crocodiles, and late one afternoon they 
spied a giant ant-eater on the grass-clad bank. Pushing 
off in a row-boat they landed a couple of hundred yards 



404 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

from him and advanced toward him through the forest, 
taking Kermit's two dogs with them. The dogs leaped 
upon the ant-eater, who tried to defend himself by 
ripping blows with his great clawed feet; but he was 
soon overcome and carried back to the boat to be shipped 
in due course to the Museum in New York. 

After some miles of this travel they left the river 
and mounted their horses for a ride to the ranch. The 
way led first through a marsh whose vast drying pools 
were filled with dead and dying fish. Great numbers 
of jabiru storks, herons and black carrion vultures had 
gathered for the feast, and small fish-eating alligators 
were also abundant. They left the marsh and rode 
for miles through the open palm forest in which parrots, 
macaws, and parakeets flashed to and fro in their gaudy 
colors. South America is a bird paradise, but does not 
compare with Africa in the size and variety of its mam- 
mals. Many thousand years ago, in a period which 
geologists call recent, there were on this continent sabre- 
tooth tigers, mastodons, giant ground-sloths and many 
other huge creatures, but by some strange catastrophe 
these have all disappeared long since. 

Senhor de Barros' ranch lay in the middle of a great 
swamp country. He was a true lord of the soil, with 
30,000 head of cattle, besides horses, pigs, sheep and 
goats. From his ranch they hunted the spotted jaguars, 
shooting them from the trees in which the dogs drove 
them to take refuge. Here Roosevelt saw for the first 
time a nine-banded armadillo in its native state. He 
had always supposed that the movements of an arma- 
dillo were necessarily like those of a turtle, and was 
correspondingly surprised when he saw one, pursued 
by the dogs, make off with the speed of a rabbit. The 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 405 

dogs followed it full tilt, when it suddenly turned, and 
with its armored body clove a path for itself through 
the pack and disappeared like an animated cannon-ball 
into the safety of a thorny covert. 

After several days' enjoyment of the hospitality 
of the ranch they went back to Corumba on Christmas 
Eve and there stocked their little boat for a trip up 
another tributary of the Paraguay — the Cuyuba. On 
board they piled their food, ammunition, specimens 
and equipment and left little room for themselves. 
Three days after Christmas they reached another great 
ranch belonging to Senhor Marques, who had come 
several hundred miles down the Cuyuba to greet his 
guests. From this ranch they hunted peccaries, fierce 
little wild pigs which travel in herds and are mischievous 
if disturbed. There were quantities of birds here — 
toucans, herons, tiger-bitterns and many other species 
quite unlike the birds of any other continent. 

Their visit over, they went down again to the Para- 
guay, and turning their faces up that river arrived, on 
January 5th, at Sao Luis de Caceres, the last town which 
they were to see until they should reach the Amazon. 
Here Sigg delighted some of the inhabitants by giving 
them a ride in a dugout driven by the Evinrude motor. 

At Caceres the party left the Paraguay River and 
ascended a stream whose Indian name means the River 
of Tapirs; sixty or seventy miles up this river they 
pitched their first camp. The piranhas were dangerous 
here and two of the dogs had the tips of their tails bitten 
off as they swam. On the morning of January 9th a 
tapir hunt was organized, the hunters taking the dogs 
with them in canoes, for the tapir lives in marshy country 
and frequently takes to the water when hunted. After 



406 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

a long search a tapir was descried, swimming rapidly 
down stream with only his head above water. One 
of the dugouts pursued him and he suddenly dived, 
leaving no trace, and as suddenly reappeared climbing 
up the bank. Roosevelt fired, but the tapir, although 
wounded, galloped off through the forest and took to 
the water again farther up stream. Again the hunters 
came up with him, and again he dived, passed completely 
under Roosevelt's canoe and came up on the other side; 
there the Colonel killed him with a well-directed shot. 

On they went up the River of Tapirs, the current 
rapidly growing swifter, and on January 16th reached 
Tapirapoan, the headquarters of the Telegraphic Com- 
mission. Here they waited for several days to gather 
the pack animals and materials for the overland trip 
to the headwaters of the River of Doubt. All the speci- 
mens and unnecessary baggage were sent back to New 
York down the river, and at last, on January 21st, they 
started across country. 

Their route lay northward across the Plan Alto — a 
vast treeless plain. The men rode mules and the equip- 
ment was carried by a caravan of seventy oxen, some 
of whom bucked furiously and often scattered their 
burdens far and wide. Soon they crossed the divide 
between the basins of the Paraguay and of the Amazon. 
The real hardships of the trip now began. Heavy rains 
were frequent and the slippery soil afforded poor foot- 
hold for the mules. Feed was scarce and poor so that 
the strength of the animals gradually decreased. Pium 
flies were so numerous and vindictive that the men 
had to wear gloves and head nets. 

They visited the magnificent Salto Bello Falls on 
the Rio Sacre, and the tremendous falls of Utiarity 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 407 

on the Papagaio. The latter, in the Colonel's opinion, 
outrank any waterfall in North America except Niagara. 
At a small native village they were highly diverted 
by a game of ball, in which the players propelled a 
small hollow rubber ball entirely with their heads, 
sometimes throwing themselves flat on the ground for 
the purpose. Here Father Zahm and Sigg left them 
and the remaining party began to push across the wild 
country inhabited by the Nhambiquaras. This was a 
land of fever and beriberi, of incessant rain and poor 
feed, and of the maddening pium flies. The mules and 
oxen were growing weak and the Canadian canoe, 
together with a motor-engine and gasoline, had to be 
left behind to lighten their loads. They were now crossing 
numerous small rivers and brooks which formed part 
of the headwaters of the Tapajos, which is itself one 
of the mightiest tributaries of the Amazon. Before 
long they met a party of Nhambiquaras, who are wild, 
naked and absolutely primitive savages. The rain fell 
almost incessantly. 

After more than five weeks of this kind of travel 
they arrived at last at the River of Doubt. Before 
reaching the river the party had split. Fiala had some 
time since started on an expedition down the Papagaio. 
Miller with another party went off across country to 
descend the Gy-Parana. Roosevelt and his son Kermit, 
Colonel Rondon, Cherrie, Lieutenant Lyra, Doctor 
Cajazeira and sixteen paddlers were left to attempt 
the descent of the River of Doubt. They took with 
them partial rations for about fifty days, tents, a few 
books, and such necessities as food, medicine, blankets 
and surveying instruments. They were about to embark 
upon an adventure whose extent it was absolutely 



408 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

impossible to determine. They might soon find them- 
selves on easily navigable water, or they might be obliged 
to struggle for weeks through untold hardships. Time 
alone would show. They were facing certain danger 
and possible death. 

On February £7, 1914, shortly after mid-day, they 
started in their seven dugout canoes, only three of 
which were really first-class. Roosevelt traveled with 
Cherrie and the doctor in a large canoe handled by 
three native paddlers. All the way down the river 
it was necessary to stop at short intervals to survey. 
During the first day Kermit carried the sighting-rod 
and landed nearly a hundred times, and they made in 
all about six miles. The water was high and traveling 
at first was easy. On both sides of the stream rose solid 
walls of matted forest, in which at night a space was 
cleared with the axes for the camp. 

On they went through the silent forest where white 
men had never been before. On the fourth day the 
current began to quicken, and they heard the roar of 
rapids ahead. They walked down along the edge of 
the stream and found that the rapids were absolutely 
impassable and that the portage would be a difficult 
one. It took two days and a half to carry their boats 
and equipment down to the foot of the rapids over 
the stony and difficult portage, which was nearly a mile 
in length. The rain poured down and swarms of bees 
and flies attacked them. Fly ointment was resorted to 
which was useful until it was washed off by perspiration; 
but some of the insects were so small that a head net 
was no protection. Ants, too, were numerous and vora- 
cious; one night they ate all of the doctor's undershirt 
and chewed holes in his mosquito net. 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 409 

The difficulties of portaging were great on account 
of the weight of the boats. A road had to be cut through 
the solid forest and on this were laid small logs to act 
as rollers. The boats were then hauled out of the river 
with a block and tackle and were pulled over the rollers 
by sheer force. x\t the bottom of the first portage where 
the canoes were launched again, one of them filled with 
water and went to the bottom, so that more time and 
labor were consumed in raising it. 

The next day came more rapids whose passage took 
three days to accomplish. No sooner was this done 
than more rapids were reached and the party began 
to realize that many weary days of such work were 
ahead of them. The insects had become a torment. 
Lyra and Kermit Roosevelt and the natives, working 
in the water to let the canoes through difficult places, 
often brushed against overhanging branches from which 
hordes of biting ants swarmed on them. There was 
no rest by day and little by night from flies, gnats, 
mosquitoes, ants, bees and multitudes of other small 
vindictive creatures. 

By March 10th they had come only sixty miles 
and had no idea how much farther they were to travel. 
Next morning they found that two of the canoes had 
broken their moorings and had been dashed to pieces 
on the rocks. The men immediately set about in the 
pouring rain to build two other boats to take their 
places. Three days later they were again on their 
way. During all this time a tremendous rain had 
continued practically without cessation, and every 
one's clothes were wet day and night. The native 
paddlers generally went barefoot or wore sandals; 
in consequence, their feet were so swollen and 



410 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

inflamed from insect bites that at times they were 
unable to work. 

On March 15th, after paddling four miles down the 
river, they came to another rapids. Venturing too 
near the beginning of the swift water, the canoe contain- 
ing Kermit and his paddlers was swept in in an instant. 
Down they went through the rapids with the canoe 
right side up but almost full of water. At the bottom 
it seemed that they would make the shore, but a sudden 
eddy carried them to mid-stream and turned them over. 
One of the paddlers swam strongly and reached the shore, 
but the other was sucked down by the boiling torrent 
and was never seen again. Kermit climbed on the bot- 
tom of the boat and was whirled down the next series 
of rapids. When he reached the bottom he was almost 
drowned and close to exhaustion, but he had enough 
strength left to swim to an overhanging branch and 
finally to make the shore. 

They camped by these rapids for the night, and 
next morning put on the post with which they marked 
their camping spot, the inscription, "In these rapids 
died poor Simplicio." Then they pressed on past more 
rapids and through the interminable rain. On the next 
day, while Colonel Rondon was exploring the bank 
of the river, accompanied by one of the dogs, a strange 
howling noise, which sounded like spider-monkeys, 
attracted his attention and the dog ran ahead to inves- 
tigate. In a minute he heard the animal coming toward 
him yelping with pain, and then suddenly there was 
silence. Accompanied by Lyra, Kermit and one of the 
natives, Rondon found the dog dead with two arrows 
through his body. It was evident that he had been 
killed by Indians. 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 411 

By this time they had been gone eighteen days and 
had used over a third of their food, although they had 
traveled but eighty miles. It was now necessary to 
lighten the loads and to travel so as to avoid possible 
Indian attacks. Accordingly they abandoned all the 
baggage that they could possibly spare, leaving, among 
other things, two big tents and a box of surveying instru- 
ments. Personal belongings were cut to the minimum. 
Thus equipped they started again down the river, Roose- 
velt and the doctor traveling in the two canoes with 
six paddlers, while the rest of the party went on foot 
down the bank. They passed the mouth of a small 
stream coming in from the west, which Colonel Rondon 
named the Rio Kermit, and soon afterwards reached 
a little Indian fishing village, from which the inhabitants 
had fled in panic. Here they left an axe and a knife 
and some red beads, as signs of friendship, and pressed 
steadily on. Four canoes had been lost by this time 
and it was decided to build two large ones to take their 
places; a space was cleared in the forest for a camp 
and the men set to work. There were piranhas in the 
river but the party bathed in spite of them. The danger 
from cannibal fish could not deter them from seeking 
a respite from the tormenting insects. 

They were now down to two meals a day, eked out 
by palm-tops when they could get them, and occa- 
sionally by small game or fish. The lack of food and the 
tremendous physical labor were beginning to tell on 
the party. Some of the men had fever, and were only 
kept from serious sickness by repeated doses of quinine. 
The rapids grew more and more continuous and the 
spaces of open water between them shorter and shorter. 
In one place two laden canoes were swept under by the 



412 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

current and were only saved after hours of arduous toil. 
They reached a range of low mountains, through 
which the river ran in a long canyon with several high 
waterfalls. Again they cut down their equipment, 
keeping only one tent and less clothing than was really 
necessary. The canoes were lowered through the rapids 
and the equipment was carried along the almost impass- 
able sides of the rocky gorge. One of the canoes had 
its bottom beaten out on the rocks, and another was 
lost further down in a piece of furious rapids. The 
insect bites had become festering wounds, and poisonous 
ants, flies, ticks, and bees were a perpetual torment. 
Among the natives was a powerful man named 
Julio. He was sullen and a shirker and had been caught 
stealing food, which was a very serious crime. One 
evening Paishon, a negro corporal, caught him in the 
act of theft and struck him in the mouth. The next 
day Julio, having carried his burden down the portage, 
picked up a rifle and went back along the trail, osten- 
sibly to hunt. A minute later the party heard a shot, 
and hurrying back, found Paishon lying dead, shot 
through the heart. Julio had vanished. They did not 
try to pursue the murderer, for starvation and sickness 
were staring them in the face. Three days later as they 
were paddling down the stream, he suddenly appeared 
and called out that he wanted to surrender. No one 
answered him, but at the next halt Colonel Rondon 
decided that it was his duty, as an officer of the Bra- 
zilian government, to take the man in custody. Two 
of the natives were sent back to find him but they 
returned empty handed. Julio was never seen again. 
Shortly after this, Roosevelt, while working in the 
water with an upset canoe, struck his leg against a 



THE RIVER OF DOUBT 413 

boulder. The wound became badly inflamed and for 
two days he lay desperately ill. He realized that the 
food was running out and vainly implored Colonel 
Rondon to leave him behind and to lead the rest of the 
party to safety. Then the fever broke a little and he 
was able to struggle to his feet, but he had to be carried 
over the portages by two of the natives on an improvised 
chair. Kermit, Lyra and Cherrie were also sick but 
continued to work most of the time in spite of it. 

But now the rocky gorge was past and there were 
fewer rapids. One day they made over twenty miles, 
which was a great encouragement. They passed the 
mouth of a big river running in from the right which 
they named the Rio Cardozo, after a friend of Colonel 
Rondon's. Soon after this they shot some game and 
caught an enormous catfish, and were very grateful 
for the taste of fresh meat. On Easter Sunday they 
struck rapids again and spent eight hours portaging 
and only ten minutes in paddling, but by way of com- 
pensation they got twenty-eight big fish, and for two 
meals they all had as much as they wanted to eat. 

April 15th was a great day. They had run two hours 
and a half down the stream when they found a post 
with a board on it bearing the initials J. A. This post 
marked the farthest limits of a rubber-man's explorations. 
An hour later they came to a newly built house whose 
inhabitants, however, were not there, and an hour after 
that reached the home of an old Brazilian peasant. 
He was the first human being whom they had seen since 
they had started down the river nearly seven weeks 
before. 

It was time for the journey to end. The strain had 
begun to tell on them all. Roosevelt's leg was giving 



414 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

him serious trouble and had developed an abscess which 
had to be drained and bandaged. No sooner had they 
passed the worst part of the trip than he developed 
a serious fever, through which he was nursed for ten 
days by the ceaseless care of his son and their com- 
panions. 

Farther down the river they spent their last night 
under canvas, and the next morning gathered at the 
monument which Colonel Rondon had erected, while 
he read the orders of the day. He recited the principal 
events of the expedition and declared that the River 
of Doubt was hereafter, by order of the Brazilian Gov- 
ernment, to be known as the Rio Roosevelt. Subse- 
quently this name was changed to Rio Teodoro — the 
River Theodore. From here on travel was easy. Soon 
a steamer was reached which took the party down to the 
Madeira River, from which the trip to the Amazon 
and so back to the United States, was a luxury for the 
weary explorers. 

The expedition had been a very considerable achieve- 
ment, both from a zoological and a geographical stand- 
point. Cherrie and Miller had collected three thousand 
specimens, many of which were new to science. All 
of them together had, to use the Colonel's words, "put 
upon the map a river some fifteen hundred kilometers 
in length, of which the upper course was not merely 
utterly unknown to, but unguessed at by, anybody; 
while the lower course, although known for years to a 
few rubber-men, was utterly unknown to cartographers." 
The expedition had been arduous and might easily 
have proved fatal to any one of them, but consistent 
willingness and perseverance had triumphed over the 
most formidable natural obstacles. 



CHAPTER XXVII 

Political Career After 1912 

ON his arrival from South America on May 19, 
1914, Roosevelt had by no means recovered 
from the effects of his trip and the serious illness 
through which he had passed. Nevertheless, he at once 
arranged to take part in the political campaign for 
members of Congress and for Governors which was then 
under way, although the only definite early speaking 
engagement he made was to make an address in Pitts- 
burgh on June 30th. In that state Gifford Pinchot 
and I were candidates on the Progressive ticket for 
Senator and Governor respectively. 

Roosevelt had only been in the country for a few 
days when he sailed for Spain to attend the wedding 
of his son Kermit at the American Embassy in Madrid. 
He was back again in New York before the end of June. 
Before going to Madrid he had asked me to write out 
what I thought he ought to say at Pittsburgh and he 
added, "I may not say it, but it is better for me to have 
something/' The next day after his return I went to 
Oyster Bay with the manuscript in my pocket. He 
used but very little of it because with his usual fore- 
handedness, knowing that he had to make the address, 
he wrote out on the return steamer, in spite of his phy- 
sical condition, practically all that he wanted to say. 
This Pittsburgh address was really a wonderful exhi- 
bition of will-power. He ought never to have made it. 

When his train arrived in Pittsburgh he was really 

(415) 



416 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

thoroughly exhausted and yet he held a great audience 
for over an hour, and I am sure that only those immedi- 
ately near him on the platform realized the conscious 
physical exertion he was undergoing. 

Some weeks later, when the New York campaign 
was well under way, he toured a large part of the state 
in an automobile with the Progressive candidate for 
Governor. He also made addresses in Louisiana and other 
states, and went through Pennsylvania in a special 
train, speaking in behalf of the Progressive candidates 
for United States Senator and Governor. Here he was 
everywhere greeted by great crowds which, as far as 
those of us who accompanied him could see, were no 
less numerous and enthusiastic than they had been 
two years before. 

The results of the fall elections, if not a surprise, 
were a great disappointment to him. The total Pro- 
gressive vote fell from over 4,000,000 to slightly under 
2,000,000. The Progressive party's representation in 
Congress was reduced from fifteen to seven members. 
The party failed to carry a single state except California, 
where Hiram W. Johnson was re-elected by a plurality 
of 130,000. Though a large vote was also polled in 
Pennsylvania, the results of the elections, taken as a 
whole, showed that the Progressive party, as a political 
organization, was beginning to disintegrate. Indeed, 
outside of two or three states, there was no effective 
local party organization. 

During these closing days of political activity Roose- 
velt was a party to two famous libel suits in which 
his personal and political career were so carefully scru- 
tinized by his enemies and so completely exposed to public 
view that no serious fault could have escaped detection. 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 417 

The first of these was the Newett case. George A. 
Newett had held the position of postmaster in Ishpeming, 
Michigan, by Roosevelt's appointment, and had been 
his strong supporter for some years. In 1912, however, 
he remained in the Republican party and became one 
of Roosevelt's bitter opponents. On October 12, 1912, 
shortly before the Presidential election, he published 
in his weekly paper, the Iron Ore, this statement: 
"Roosevelt lies and curses in a most disgusting way. He 
gets drunk too, and that not infrequently, and all his 
intimates know about it." 

For some time these slanders, especially with respect 
to intoxication, had been circulated by Roosevelt's 
enemies, and on one or two occasions had appeared 
in irresponsible newspapers. He finally determined to 
wait until such a statement appeared in a reputable 
paper and then to nail the lie once and forever. Accord- 
ingly, less than two weeks after Newett's statement 
appeared, he brought suit for libel. On May 26, 1913, 
the case came to trial at Ishpeming before a jury of 
plain American citizens. Roosevelt's purpose was to 
show that the accusations of blasphemy and drunk- 
enness were totally unfounded falsehoods. 

Thirty -five witnesses testified in his behalf, covering 
the whole of his life from the time he was twenty-one. 
The case had been prepared with great care by Roosevelt 
and by his counsel, James H. Pound and his assistants. 
For the fifteen years immediately preceding the trial 
they produced testimony which covered almost every 
hour of Roosevelt's waking life. His friends eagerly 
came to testify to his unimpeachable personal character. 
There were personal friends such as Jacob A. Riis and 
Albert Shaw; business associates such as Lyman Abbott, 

27 



418 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the editor of the Outlook; cousins from Oyster Bay; 
the naturalists who had traveled with him in Africa; 
Dr. Alexander Lambert, who had been his family phy- 
sician and camping companion for many years; men 
who had served under him when he was President, 
such as Loeb, Pinchot and Garfield; servants in his 
house; secret service men; newspaper correspondents; 
and General Leonard Wood, who had been intimately 
thrown with him not only in Cuba but often thereafter. 
All of these testified to the same effect: that they had 
never seen Roosevelt drink any alcoholic beverage 
other than wine except as a medicine; that he was very 
sparing in his use even of wine, and that he had never 
been influenced even to the slightest degree by anything 
that he had drunk. They also proved conclusively 
the falsity of the charge of blasphemy. 

The presentation of this mass of testimony occupied 
a full week. "When it had been fully presented, the 
defendant made a statement in which he explained 
that he had published the libellous charges upon infor- 
mation which he had believed to be correct, but that 
in casting about to prepare his defense, he had been 
unable to find any one who could state from his own 
knowledge that he had ever seen Roosevelt under the 
influence of liquor. He said that he had been profoundly 
impressed by the tremendous weight of evidence which 
had been produced, and concluded by saying that he 
was now forced to the conclusion that he had been 
mistaken. 

This was all Roosevelt wanted. As soon as Xewett 
had finished he said to the court: "I did not go into 
this suit for money. I did not go into it for any vindictive 
purpose. I went into it, and, as the court has said, 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 419 

I made my reputation an issue, because I wished, once 
for all during my lifetime, thoroughly and comprehen- 
sively to deal with these slanders, so that never again 
will it be possible for any man, in good faith, to repeat 
them. I have achieved my purpose, and I am content." 
The jury, by direction of the court, then found a verdict 
in Roosevelt's favor in the nominal sum of six cents. 

The case is interesting, not only because it proves 
conclusively the cleanness of Roosevelt's private life, 
but because it shows the extraordinary thoroughness 
with which he prosecuted any undertaking to which 
he turned his hand. The array of witnesses and the care- 
ful manner in which they were chosen to cover every 
portion of his life, so far as that was possible, indicated 
his determination to make his vindication complete 
and lasting; and complete and lasting it certainly was. 

In the other famous libel suit of which I have spoken, 
Roosevelt was the defendant instead of the plaintiff. 
In July, 1914, he made a statement in support of Harvey 
D. Hinman, who was a candidate for the Republican 
and Progressive nominations for Governor of Xew York. 
In this statement he alleged that William Barnes, Jr., 
the Republican leader in the state, was in a bi-partisan 
alliance with the Democratic State Organization in 
the interests of crooked politics and crooked business. 
Barnes responded by bringing suit for libel and the case 
finally came on to trial at Syracuse on April 19, 1915. 

The trial lasted for more than a month. Roosevelt's 
political record was gone over with a fine-tooth comb. 
His relations with Senator Piatt while he was Governor 
of New York were subjected to the closest scrutiny. 
The story of the campaign contributions in 1904 was 
again dragged out before the public view. No stone 



420 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

was left unturned in the attempt to show that he himself 
had been guilty of practicing the crooked politics for 
which he had reproved Barnes. But there was nothing 
of which the Colonel had any cause to be ashamed, 
and the most exhaustive examination and cross-exami- 
nation, which was pursued for days, brought no results 
to the plaintiff. 

Then came Roosevelt's turn. He showed that Barnes, 
through his newspaper, the Albany Evening Journal, 
had made unlawful profits in public printing. He showed 
the bi-partisan alliance with the Democratic machine 
and how it had operated to defeat legislation or to elect 
candidates. His witnesses were familiar with their 
facts and impressed the jury with their veracity. Justice 
Andrews, when the evidence was all in, charged the 
jury that the questions for their consideration were 
whether there had been an alliance between Barnes 
and the Democratic leaders, and whether Barnes had 
worked through a corrupt alliance between crooked 
politics and crooked business. For two days the jury 
deliberated and then returned a verdict in favor of 
the defendant. In other words, they believed Roosevelt's 
statements to be true. He had done the public a real 
service not only by exposing the practices of the bi- 
partisan machine but by vindicating the right of an 
honest man to speak the truth about that machine. 
For himself, he had brought before the people the details 
of his political life and had shown that its fairness was 
above reproach- 
As the Presidential campaign for 1916 approached, 
it was the hope of the Progressives, and of large numbers 
of those who had never left the Republican party, that 
the Republicans would nominate Roosevelt and thus 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 421 

pave the way for a reunion of the two parties. To this 
end it was arranged that the second Progressive National 
Convention should take place at Chicago on June 7th, 
the same day as the Republican Convention. 

That the Progressives would nominate Roosevelt 
was a foregone conclusion. Roosevelt, himself, while 
he consented to the effort being made to secure his 
nomination by the Republicans, had not the slightest 
expectation that it would be successful. Those who 
still remained members of the Progressive party could 
not vote in the Republican primaries, and of course 
this meant a large reduction in his strength in the Repub- 
lican party as compared with four years before. Those 
who had opposed him in 1912, while their feelings in 
reference to him were no longer as violent as they had 
been, were for the most part still opposed to him. They 
had not forgiven him for forming a third party, and still 
attributed the defeat of the Republicans in the election 
of that year to him rather than to the mistakes of their 
own leaders. All these adverse factors were appreciated 
not only by Roosevelt, but also by the other Progressive 
leaders. 

But Roosevelt himself had an additional reason for 
believing that he could not be nominated in the Repub- 
lican Convention. He saw that his campaign for pre- 
paredness and his general position in regard to the duties 
imposed on the United States by the events of the great 
war in Europe made his candidacy peculiarly objection- 
able to a considerable class of persons of German descent 
whose sympathies were with the Central Powers. He 
was convinced that, combined with the other causes 
we have mentioned, the fear of the German vote would 
make practically impossible his nomination by the 



422 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

type of men who would naturally go to the Republican 
Convention in the absence of progressive competition. 
His opinion was justified by the event. The convention 
was made up of three classes of persons: men who 
wanted to nominate Roosevelt, men who disliked and 
distrusted him, or at least had not forgiven him for what 
they called his treachery to the party, and men who 
were afraid that if he were nominated he could not be 
elected because of the opposition of German sympathizers. 
The last two classes largely outnumbered the first. 

Of course the delegates to the Republican Convention 
wanted to nominate a candidate who could win, and 
every delegate knew that no Republican candidate 
could win if Roosevelt ran on a Progressive ticket. 
A three-party fight would insure the return of the Demo- 
crats to power. But Roosevelt had been unsparing 
in his criticism of the Democratic administration for 
its course towards Mexico and for what he regarded 
as its apparent indifference and even antagonism to 
any preparation for the event of war, as well as for its 
whole manner of dealing with the questions arising 
out of the war. And it is a high compliment to the 
belief of the delegates in Roosevelt's sense of public 
duty, that the great majority had absolute confidence 
that if they could nominate a candidate of high character 
whose record was not wholly reactionary, Roosevelt 
would support him rather than accept the nomination 
of the Progressive party and thus insure the return 
of the Democratic administration to power. 

In Mr. Justice Hughes the delegates to the Repub- 
lican Convention had just the candidate they desired. 
His nomination was practically assured before the 
convention met. Four years before, had the leaders 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 423 

kept their hands off the situation, the delegates, left 
to themselves, would have gone to Roosevelt with a 
hurrah. In this convention of 1916, had some of the 
leaders not hesitated, Hughes would have been nominated 
as rapidly as possible. 

The leaders did hesitate, and appointed a committee 
to confer with a similar committee appointed by the 
Progressive Convention to ascertain if a candidate 
satisfactory to both conventions could not be nominated. 
They did this because the enthusiasm of the delegates 
to the Progressive Convention showed that a real third 
party might still be ready to make the fight. The story 
of this Progressive Convention will some day be 
adequately told. A party which existed as an effective 
political organization only in spots, succeeded not only 
in going through all the forms of a great national con- 
vention, but in kindling anew among the delegates 
the fire and enthusiasm of four years before. But that 
is not the story of Roosevelt. True, he was the source 
of the inspiration and of the enthusiasm, but the exec- 
utive direction that made possible this great national 
convention was that of Mr. George W. Perkins, who 
was chairman of the Executive Committee of the Pro- 
gressive National Committee. From the beginning 
of the movement to nominate Roosevelt in 1912, he 
had given of his time and means to promote the progres- 
sive cause. The plan to force the Republican party 
to nominate Roosevelt in 1916 was primarily his plan. 
Every movement was well thought out and skilfully 
executed and the effort only failed of success because 
from the start success was impossible. 

The great majority of the delegates to the Progressive 
Convention throughout all the first meetings were 



424 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

buoyed up by the conviction that the Republicans 
would nominate Roosevelt. Many believed that the 
correct policy was to nominate him in the Progressive 
Convention and then adjourn, thus ending any hope 
of compromise on any other candidate. They failed 
to realize that such a course would place Roosevelt 
in the impossible position of declaring that he was the 
only candidate on whom the two parties could unite. 
But more than once the natural but wholly unwarranted 
suspicion went over the assembly that the leaders who 
counselled any other course were being fooled or were 
guilty of treachery to Roosevelt. Only the ability and 
force of Raymond Robbins, the chairman, and the 
absolute confidence of the delegates in him, kept the 
assembly from getting out of hand. 

For my own part, the recollection of those days 
and nights is like a nightmare. I had little hope 
of our success, and no one could have been a part 
of that gathering without realizing how bitter would 
be the inevitable disappointment of the delegates. 
There was, however, one moment of real satisfaction. 
I was again chairman of the Resolutions, or Platform, 
Committee, and as chairman, my duty was to read 
the platform prepared by the committee to the 
convention. For the first time, I believe, in the 
history of national conventions, the platform was 
not adopted until each plank had been voted on 
separately, and over many of the planks there was 
extended debate. But when I came to the plank 
dealing with the obligation of every citizen of a democ- 
racy to prepare in time of peace to defend the country 
in time of war, a great shout went up from the assembly. 
Then I knew that Roosevelt's educational campaign 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 425 

for preparedeness had been successful with the great 
majority of those who followed him originally because 
of his position on social legislation and on the right 
of the people to rule; and I knew also that the way 
in which this plank had been received would give him 
greater satisfaction than anything that had happened 
at the convention. 

Saturday morning, the fourth day of the convention, 
as soon as word came that the Republicans were about 
to nominate Justice Hughes, the Progressives nominated 
Roosevelt. He at once telegraphed from Oyster Bay 
saying that the nomination would be declined if an 
immediate answer was desired, but that the declination 
would be regarded as conditional if it was referred to 
the Progressive National Committee. A meeting of 
the National Committee was called for June 26th, 
and the second and last Progressive National Con- 
vention adjourned. 

Within a few hours of Mr. Justice Hughes' nomination 
by the Republican Convention in Chicago, James R. 
Garfield and I, at Roosevelt's request, left Chicago 
for Oyster Bay. His object in sending for us was to 
have at first hand an account of the occurrences of the 
Progressive Convention and a better idea than was 
possible over the telephone of the sentiments and opinions 
of the different elements of which that convention had 
been composed. 

We arrived in New York Monday morning and a 
few hours later an automobile delivered us at Sagamore 
Hill. It was a lovely June morning. I have never seen 
the rolling, wooded country, the cove on which the 
little village of Oyster Bay is situated, and Sagamore 
Hill itself, wear a more charming aspect. Personally, 



426 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

however, I was out of tune with the beauty of the day, 
and this, I think, was true also of my companion. The 
ordeal of the Progressive Convention, the days and 
nights with little or no sleep, the disappointment at the 
result, had told on both of us; although the journey on 
the train had been a rest, we were far from rested. We 
found the Colonel and Mrs. Roosevelt sitting on the 
side porch. I have never seen him more serene. There 
was not a trace of disappointment. We had not been 
with him ten minutes before our own overstrained nerves 
were relaxed. His moods were always contagious, and 
that morning he was content. Of course he would have 
been glad to have become President. As he himself 
expressed it, he enjoyed the job. But he also enjoyed 
many other things; above all, his home, his family, 
and all things pertaining to his life as a country gentle- 
man. And so he was content, and his visitors, catching 
his spirit, grew content also. 

Not that he did not desire the nomination. He 
did desire it, but his whole heart and soul were in the 
work of arousing the American people to the duty of 
preparing, by military training, and in other ways, 
to maintain the rights and carry out the obligations 
of the United States. No man saw more clearly than 
he the German menace. The only reason for desiring 
the nomination which had any real hold on him at the 
time was the realization of the fact that through the 
nomination, and the consequent campaign for the Presi- 
dency, he would have the supreme opportunity of arousing 
the American people to the danger of their unpreparedness 
for war. As he himself said, " My only regret is that I would 
have been able to carry on an educational campaign in a 
manner far more effective than for me is now possible.'* 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 427 

For nearly three hours we went over with him all 
the details of the wonderful gathering, not of the dele- 
gates of an organized party, but of the patriotic men 
and women composing the second and last National 
Convention of the Progressive party. No one was 
better fitted than Garfield, who had been floor leader, 
to give him the details, and, what was more important, 
the wonderful spirit which had animated the convention, 
a spirit which those who witnessed it, as well as those 
of us who were a part of it, will never forget. 

Apart from his appreciation of the personal devotion 
to him shown by the delegates, he was most affected 
by the knowledge of the way in which the convention 
had reacted to the new issues which the European War 
had forced on the country. As I had anticipated, he 
was especially gratified and pleased with my account 
of the reception by the convention of the preparedness 
plank in the platform. 

The action of the Progressive Convention in nom- 
inating Colonel Roosevelt practically left entirely to 
him the question whether the Progressive party should 
or should not be continued. Of the right course for him 
to take he had not the slightest doubt. He believed 
that the forthcoming utterances of Mr. Hughes, as 
well as the attitude which Mr. Hughes would take 
in the ensuing two weeks towards Progressives, would 
make it improper for him to accept the Progressive 
nomination. His criticisms of the Democratic admin- 
istration had been unsparing. To insure the re-election 
of the President by refusing to unite and to urge all 
Progressives to unite to secure the President's defeat 
would have been not only foolish, but morally unjus- 
tifiable. All this he stated to us clearly and somewhat 



428 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

emphatically, because he was already in receipt of many 
telegrams urging him to run as a third party candidate, 
and he never had much sympathy with persons who 
recommended unpractical action, especially if he believed 
the action under the circumstances essentially immoral. 

As anticipated, Mr. Hughes' position on public 
questions and his attitude towards the Progressive 
leaders who had called upon him was such that Roosevelt 
could follow his first impulse. He sent a communication 
to the Progressive National Committee, in Chicago, 
definitely declining the nomination, and declaring his 
intention to support Mr. Hughes. The great majority 
of the leaders of the party and of its members followed 
his advice and voted the Republican ticket in November. 
Mr. John M. Parker, of Louisiana, who was the nominee 
of the convention for Vice-President, and a few others 
prominent in the party, campaigned and voted for 
President Wilson. 

Roosevelt made his first speech for Hughes at Lewis- 
ton, on August 31st, and thereafter took an active part 
in his campaign, going as far west as Arizona. The 
contest was close, and the result was in doubt for several 
days after the election. Hughes carried most of the 
eastern states, but the southern and western vote 
finally swung the balance in favor of the President. 
Whether Roosevelt was surprised at Hughes' defeat, 
I can not say. Most eastern Republicans certainly 
expected to succeed, but Roosevelt had traveled in the 
West during the campaign, and was probably more in 
touch with the sentiment there than were most of 
Hughes' Eastern supporters. 

Roosevelt's whole record as President, and the whole 
course of his political actions after leaving the White 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 429 

House, as well as his speeches and editorials, show 
that his economic, social and political point of view 
towards questions was that of the evolutionist. He did 
not believe in revolution, violent or peaceful. He was 
not a political philosopher, dreaming of a new heaven 
and a new earth. 

There are three political types. One of these is 
the very large class who instinctively oppose change. 
These usually admit many existing evils, but are quite 
sure that these evils are for the most part due to "human 
nature," for which, of course, no one is responsible. 
At the other extreme are those reformers who look 
out upon the world and find it on the whole very bad; 
who want to sweep aside, at one stroke, existing insti- 
tutions and basic economic and social ideas. To this 
class belong some of our socialists, and perhaps all of 
the Bolsheviki and other extremists. The third group 
are those who have no desire to turn the world upside 
down. They believe that permanent progress can only 
be secured by successive orderly changes in the modern 
industrial system and by eliminating its injustices one 
by one. 

To this third group Roosevelt belonged. He believed, 
without question, in all the fundamental principles 
upon which the material civilization of Europe and 
America are based — such as private property, private 
control of fixed capital, and private industrial enter- 
prise. He refused to believe that the extreme conser- 
vatives and extreme radicals are right in their common 
assumption that poverty and destitution and great 
differences in wealth and opportunity are inherent 
elements of an industrial society having these conceptions 
of property, capital and enterprise. He was a great 



430 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

leader, not of the conservatives, not of the radicals, 
but of the moderates, the greatest single force in the 
country making for progress along historic Anglo-Saxon 
lines— the foremost disciple of orderly progress, equally 
opposed to reaction and to revolution. 

As we have seen, the chief underlying motives of 
Roosevelt's political action are found in his desire to 
prevent the Republican party from becoming the party 
opposed to change. Even his absorption in the progress 
of the World War did not prevent his taking every oppor- 
tunity to urge the necessity of meeting dangerous radi- 
calism by a frank recognition of existing evils and deter- 
mined efforts for their correction. An illustration of 
his desire to awaken conservatives to the danger of 
indifference to social reform occurred on a visit to Phil- 
adelphia which he made a little over a year ago. He 
was the guest of Mr. Thomas Robins, who asked a number 
of persons prominent in the financial, social and political 
world to meet him at luncheon. I met him at the station, 
and on the way to Mr. Robins' house, he expressed 
his satisfaction at the opportunity which this would 
give him — an opportunity which he did not neglect — to 
impress the other guests with the importance of meeting 
existing social evils by constructive legislation. As 
examples of minimum reforms, I remember that he 
cited measures for the insurance of workmen against 
old age, sickness and unemployment. Again, before 
the luncheon, to a small group, he talked for nearly 
an hour on the danger of the movement which we have 
since come to know as Bolshevism, foretelling with 
wonderful accuracy how it would spread over Europe 
and how it would affect the United States. 

The question is universally asked whether, had he 



POLITICAL CAREER AFTER 1912 431 

lived, he would have been the Republican candidate 
for President in 1920. Personally, I believe that there 
is only one possible answer to the question. When 
the time for the next Republican Convention came, 
there would have been an unanimous demand for his 
nomination, which he ought not, and would not, have 
declined. On the other hand, I am quite certain that 
he would have been glad to avoid another contest for 
the Presidency. The loss of old friendships in 1912 
was a great grief to him. In the year preceding his 
death these old friendships had been renewed and most 
of the scars of contest had been healed. I think this 
era of good feeling made him apprehensive of new broils. 
In April, 1918, a friend referred to the year 1921 as the 
year when he would again enter the White House. He 
had been in one of his jocular moods, but he immediately 
became very serious. "No," he said, "not I. I don't 
want it, and I don't think I am the man to be nominated. 
I made too many enemies and the people are tired of 
my candidacy." 

This attitude towards his own candidacy, however, 
did not mean that he was not looking forward to taking 
part in the next Presidential contest. Though he did 
not desire, and perhaps did not expect, to be the candidate, 
he did expect to make, in 1920, what he realized would 
probably be the last great effort of his life. This effort 
would have been to unite all elements of the Republican 
party on a platform and on a man who would represent 
those fundamental ideals of democratic rule, social 
justice, and foreign policy which, throughout his life 
he spent himself to advance. 



CHAPTER XXVIII 

Books and Speeches* 

ONE of the great interests of Roosevelt's life was 
his literary work. He began this in college 
and continued it until his death. At first he 
directed his attention most to historical writing but as 
time w T ent on and his life became fuller and fuller, the 
chronicling of his own activities and convictions occupied 
him more and more. 

It was with history that he began his literary career, 
his first volume being "The History of the Naval War 
of 1812," of which he wrote the early chapters while 
still in college. Two years later the book was published 
and, unlike most youthful efforts, it proved to be on 
the whole a decidedly good performance. In the first 
place, he went to first-hand sources for his facts, thereby 
correcting many mistakes of earlier historians, both 
American and British. Furthermore, despite his ardent 
patriotism, he strove to be thoroughly impartial. He 
showed, for instance, that Perry's fight on Lake Erie 
was by no means a triumph against odds; for though 
the British fleet had a greater number of guns, the 
American vessels threw half again as much metal as 
did their adversaries. On the other hand, he demonstrated 
that the victory of Lake Champlain had been under- 
valued. The maneuvering in every fight was, for the 

*In the writing of this chapter I have had the invaluable help of Mr. C. Wharton 
Stork, the author and critic, and of Mr. Roger B. Merriman, Assistant Professor of 

History at Harvard University. 

W. D. L. 

(432) 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 433 

first time, accurately described. But the heroic spirit 
of adventure was never lost sight of. Skill and courage, 
whether of friend or foe, were made to stand out strongly 
before the imagination of the reader. 

His longest and most painstaking work is "The 
Winning of the West," which he wrote in four volumes 
from 1889 to 1896. To this he dedicated his keenest 
enthusiasm and his most thorough research, and it is 
regarded by many critics as his most enduring contri- 
bution to literature. It shows a wholly admirable, 
scholarly audacity, the lack of which is responsible 
for the ridiculously narrow and over-specialized mono- 
graphs turned out by some of our universities today. 
It was certainly no small feat, considering the difficulty 
of finding and collecting material thirty years ago, 
to produce the first work on the history of our territorial 
expansion from 1769 to 1807, which recognizes the 
real significance of the great West in the development 
of American civilization. 

His ranch life in the '80's, in spite of its arduous 
toil, left considerable opportunity for writing. In the 
more exacting years at Washington as a Civil Service 
Commissioner, he found less time for literary effort, 
but he did not abandon it altogether. Indeed, he expected 
it to take a large place in his life, for he had definitely 
decided by that time not to embark in business and to 
confine himself to literature and politics. Other demands 
upon him were so incessant that he sometimes grew 
despondent in regard to his literary future. He could 
not foresee that the great public work upon which he 
was so soon to enter would add greatly both to his power 
of writing and to the value of what he should write. 

He enjoyed his literary work thoroughly and found 

28 



434 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

relaxation in it from the most pressing public cares. 
As soon as he returned from Cuba in 1898, he talked 
over the publication of "The Rough Riders" in magazine 
form with Robert Bridges, the editor of Scribner's. 
Shortly thereafter he began his campaign for the 
Governorship, but neither the campaign nor his duties 
after he took office prevented him from delivering the 
various instalments on schedule time. 

One day during his Presidency he sent for Mr. 
Bridges, and taking him into his library, drew from a 
drawer in the desk the complete manuscript of "Outdoor 
Pastimes of an American Hunter," ready for the printer, 
title page and all. "It isn't customary," he said "for 
Presidents to publish a book during office, but I am going 
to publish this one." 

The life of Oliver Cromwell was also written amid 
heavy responsibilities, while he was Governor of New 
York. It was a theme which must have stirred his 
inmost soul. The characters of subject and author 
had so much in common that it was almost inevitable 
that Roosevelt should have written the book. It shows 
less research than " The Winning of the West" or "The 
Naval War of 1812;" it does not always give the Royal- 
ists their due, and there are a number of minor slips; 
but a deep sympathetic understanding of the person- 
alities and the times with which it deals shines forth 
on every page. Milton's great sonnet to the Lord- 
General is the only preface. 

Roosevelt's historical works form the best possible 
antidote to the views of the deterministic school, who 
would eliminate human character, passions, and ambi- 
tions as a motive force in the development of the world. 
History for him was first and foremost a story, in which 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 435 

the man was always the principal factor, the primary 
interest. This quality, which gave such vitality to his 
writings, inevitably tinged them also with partisanship; so 
clearly and forcibly did the side that appealed to him pre- 
sent itself to his mind that he sometimes failed to appre- 
ciate the other. Certainly he was not always judicial, 
And yet the very fact that bias was so obvious made 
the defect, comparatively speaking, harmless. The 
sort of historical partisanship which is really dangerous 
is that which masquerades under the guise of impar- 
tiality; but one could see at a glance where Roosevelt's 
sympathies lay, and could make one's reservations 
accordingly. 

The majority of his casual readers would probably 
accuse him of "making the great lines of the past con- 
verge upon the point of view which the mentality of 
the moment imposes," as the modern German historian 
has so often done. Their penciled comments in the 
margins of the public library copies of his different 
works show plainly that his own political career was 
ever uppermost in their minds. It is not possible to hold 
him guiltless of this charge. When he was dealing with 
a great historical figure whose life had stood for the 
ideals he had lived for and loved, unhistorical parallels 
were bound to occur to him. But the wonder really is 
that he stopped where he did. Often there is a suggestion, 
very rarely anything more; and, in view of the variety 
and intensity of his political activities, his restraint 
in this particular is worthy of high praise. 

He usually dictated his magazine articles and books 
and then thoroughly revised the typewritten copy. 
He could carry an enormous amount of detail accurately 
in his head. When he was writing a book he would 



436 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

furnish himself with all the necessary facts and references 
and then with a pad of memoranda before him begin 
to dictate quite rapidly and with remarkable accuracy. 

Colonel W. H. Crooks speaks of the extraordinary 
facility with which he dictated. On one occasion, while 
he was in the White House, he had read a rather heavy 
historical work of considerable length. Calling in his 
stenographer he began to write a letter of criticism 
to the author of the book, and continued without pause 
for two hours. When the exhausted stenographer emerged 
from his office he was replaced by another to whom the 
President immediately began to dictate a manuscript 
dealing with important political matters. 

Roosevelt's books of adventure describing his hunting 
and exploring trips in the West and in South America 
and Africa, are first-class works of their kind. Always 
careful of the truth, he had an eye for beauty and for 
adventure which enabled him to make these books 
not only readable, but in many places absorbing. He 
was often accused of being an egotist but in these stories 
he shows the modesty of the real sportsman, leaving 
facts to speak for themselves. This they do most effect- 
ively. The man who kills a cougar with a hunting knife, 
who shoots a grizzly at such short range that it comes 
within striking distance of him, has small need of a 
medal for bravery. Nor do we fail to get the fine Anglo- 
Saxon spirit of fellowship in danger. The author's 
companions, even the dogs, are characterized with 
affection. The reader finally comes to share the hunter's 
fondness for a favorite Springfield rifle. The adventures 
are thrilling in themselves, and doubly so from the 
character of the narrator. 

"African Game Trails," which is probably the greatest 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 437 

of his hunting books, was written by his own hand 
word for word, in the depths of the Dark Continent. 
No matter how severe the day's work had been he sat 
on a camp stool every evening writing out the story 
of the day's events. As each chapter of the narrative 
was completed it was sent by runners from the heart 
of Africa to be dispatched to his publishers in America. 

In his later years his style developed possibilities 
unsuspected in his earlier works. In "The Naval War 
of 1812," and even in "The Winning of the West," 
the words did not always seem to come to him when 
he wanted them. At times the reader is conscious of a 
great pent-up force of feeling and enthusiasm, striving 
vainly to burst the bonds that prevented its expression. 
But in the course of the next twenty years his vocabulary 
increased apace. His epithets became the despair of 
his political foes, and passages of unusual and peculiar 
eloquence appeared with increasing frequency in his 
speeches and in his writings. It is not uncommon to 
find in his works such striking and eloquent passages 
as this, which occurred in his address on "History as 
Literature," delivered before the American Historical 
Association at Boston, in December 1912. 

"The true historian will bring the past before our 
eyes, as if it were the present. He will make us see as 
living men the hard-faced archers of Agincourt, and the 
war-worn spearmen who followed Alexander down beyond 
the rim of the known world. We shall hear grate on the 
coast of Britain the keels of the Low-Dutch sea-thieves 
whose children's children were to inherit unknown 
continents. We shall thrill to the triumphs of Hannibal. 
Gorgeous in our sight will rise the splendor of dead cities, 
and the might of the elder empires of which the very 



438 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

ruins crumbled to dust ages ago. Along ancient trade- 
routes, across the world's waste spaces, the caravans 
shall move; and the admirals of uncharted seas shall 
furrow the oceans with their lonely prows. Beyond 
the dim centuries we shall see the banners float above 
armed hosts. We shall see conquerors riding forward 
to victories that have changed the course of time. We 
shall listen to the prophecies of forgotten seers. Ours 
shall be the dreams of dreamers who dreamed greatly, 
who saw in their vision peaks so lofty that never yet 
have they been reached by the sons and daughters 
of men." 

He has enriched the language with striking words 
and phrases which we of this generation will not forget. 
Some of these were his own; others he made his own 
and associated irrevocably with himself. The "square 
deal," "race suicide," "malefactors of great wealth," 
the 'big stick;" who does not think of Roosevelt when 
he hears these expressions used? 

For more than seventeen years the American people 
were accustomed to read his words and to express with 
them their own thoughts. The Man with a Muck-rake 
is as old as Pilgrim's Progress, but it was Roosevelt 
who put "muck-raking" into our every-day vocabulary. 
" Pussy -footing " is also his. When a political friend 
sounded him about his candidacy for the Republican 
nomination in 1916, he answered: "Don't you do it if 
you expect me to pussy-foot on any single issue I have 
raised." We all know what "weasel words" are since 
he thus characterized the phrase "universal, voluntary, 
military training," explaining that "voluntary," like 
a weasel, sucked the strength from the "universal." 

Immediately after he left the White House in 1909 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 439 

he became a contributing editor of the Outlook and 
continued that connection for more than five years, 
until July 3, 1914. During that time he wrote exten- 
sively, and his articles and editorials form a valuable 
body of comment on current political problems and social 
conditions. During the last years of his life he was an 
associate editor of the Metropolitan Magazine and through 
its columns carried on a large part of his campaign for 
preparedness and for a whole-hearted prosecution of 
the war. 

He w T as an omnivorous reader and devoured an 
enormous quantity of books. This was partly because 
he never wasted a minute during the day, and was 
usually reading unless he was engaged in work, con- 
versation, or exercise, and partly because he had the 
remarkable faculty of reading by paragraphs. The ordinary 
man reads along word for word or, at the most, sentence 
by sentence, but Roosevelt seemed to grasp the substance 
of an entire paragraph by a rapid survey of it, and not 
only to grasp its substance, but to have phrases and even 
sentences fixed in his memory. In all my life I have 
only seen one other man who had the same gift. 

Roosevelt was not a newspaper reader. He glanced 
over the newspaper and quickly absorbed any news 
which was of real interest to him. He would pass over 
the account of a murder or of a society scandal without 
so much as seeing it, and his eye would travel straight 
to the heart of whatever he considered really vital. 

His reading was almost entirely of books and to 
some extent of magazine articles. He had a compre- 
hensive big-game library at Sagamore Hill and gave 
much time and thought to the reading of books on 
natural history. He was very fond of history, English, 



440 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

French, Greek, Latin, indeed of any nationality. At 
one of the most strenuous periods of his Presidential 
career, he suddenly became immersed in the history of 
Tamerlane. An important matter of foreign policy 
did not go forward with the speed which a certain member 
of his Cabinet desired. Some one pleaded as an excuse 
the pressure of internal affairs. "No, no," came the 
impatient Secretary's reply. "It's not that, it's those 
damned Mongols." 

He never had an idle moment. There was always 
a book by his side to which he could turn even though 
the interval for reading was only two or three minutes. 
On the trip through the Brazilian wilderness he carried 
Gibbon's History with him, and as soon as he reached 
the camping spot in the evening, would take shelter 
from the rain beneath a tree and plunge into the book. 
While he read he was totally immersed in his book and 
totally oblivious of everything else. This power of 
concentration was no doubt largely responsible for 
the fact that he remembered the subject-matter of his 
reading so accurately. 

During the Republican Convention of 1912, at 
Chicago, I suddenly found it necessary to confer with 
Roosevelt, whose headquarters were at the very end 
of the Congress Hotel from the room in which my com- 
mittee was sitting. It is a large hotel and the corridors 
and stairway were as usual jammed with an excited 
mass of humanity, shouting, "We want Teddy!" Early 
football training w T as instinctively recalled, and after 
some twenty minutes' struggle I succeeded in reaching 
his headquarters and passed through the anterooms to 
his private room. The roar of the great crowd, through 
which I had pushed my way, and of the far greater 




© Underwood it- Underwood, A*. Y ., American Press Ass'n. 

AS A PUBLIC SPEAKER 

Nine characteristic views of President Roosevelt speaking in public. His 
style was free from tricks of oratory but remarkable for the clear and forceful 
presentation of his subject. 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 441 

crowd in the streets, together with the discordant tones 
of half a dozen bands, filled the room. The Colonel was 
alone. He sat in a rocking-chair, reading. As I came in 
he looked up quietly and I saw that the book which he 
held in his hand was Herodotus, the Greek historian. 

He had an extraordinary ability to relax under the 
most unfavorable conditions, and the relaxation usually 
took the form of reading. During the campaign in 
Pennsylvania, in the fall of 1914, he toured the state 
for several days in behalf of the Progressive candidate 
for United States Senator, Gifford Pinchot, and on 
behalf of the Democratic-Progressive candidate for 
Governor, Vance McCormick. It will be remembered 
that, at the time, he had only recently returned from 
South America, and was far from being in his usual 
health. It is the testimony of those who have passed 
through the experience, that nothing is more taxing 
to the strength than a campaign tour. 

On this particular trip, Colonel Roosevelt entered 
the state at Easton, his first speech being made from the 
rear platform of the train at that place. His voice was 
far from strong, and his whole appearance was that of a 
man thoroughly tired. A few days later, when he left 
the state, after speaking many times each day from 
the train at various stations, besides long noon and 
longer evening addresses in public squares and halls, 
his voice was strong and his whole physical aspect was 
changed and improved. As a matter of fact, the cam- 
paign had rested him. He had come from a trying 
political situation in New York, and the hearty personal 
welcome he received in all parts of Pennsylvania gratified 
and stimulated him. 

Besides this, he had actually had a great deal of 



442 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

rest. He had a stateroom in the rear car, and, for the 
greater part of the time, when not meeting delegates 
or speaking, he rested in this stateroom. As was his 
custom, he had brought with him a book having nothing 
to do with politics. On this occasion it was Sir Walter 
Scott's "Anne of Geierstein," a novel which he confessed 
he found very disappointing, and for this reason the 
rest on his bed in the stateroom between speeches often 
took the form of a short doze. 

The train would stop at a station. Great mobs 
of cheering people, sometimes numbering thousands, 
crowding the station platform, would swarm over the 
tracks at the rear of the train. A local delegation would 
be admitted at the forward end of his car, while some 
member of our party would at once begin talking from 
the rear platform to the people outside who were impa- 
tient to hear "Teddy." 

It was occasionally my duty to shepherd the dele- 
gation past Colonel Roosevelt's stateroom in order 
that each one might see him personally. There was an 
element of humor in his quick transition from a sleepy 
reader of medieval story to a political leader greeting 
friends and admirers. For every guest he had a vigorous 
handshake and a hearty word of greeting as each passed 
the stateroom door. The delegation received, he would 
push his way vigorously through the crowd jammed 
in the small rear drawing-room of the car, and out on 
the platform. A three-minute talk in characteristic 
style, usually cut short by the train's pulling out of 
the station, a wave of his hand, a great shout from the 
assembled crowd, and half a minute later a rather sleepy 
gentleman was lying on the bed in his stateroom, reading 
"Anne of Geierstein." 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 443 

He was not only fond of history but of more abstruse 
subjects. Darwin, Huxley, Carlyle and Emerson were 
among his favorites. But he believed that the great 
need to be met by reading was the need of knowing 
human nature and that this could come only through 
reading the great imaginative writers, whether of prose 
or of poetry. For this reason he loved novels, poems, 
ballads and simple epics. He never did enjoy dramas 
and humbly acknowledged his failure in that respect, 
but his taste was otherwise so catholic that he can be 
forgiven a distaste for one form of literature. 

The secret of his success as a public speaker lay 
in the charm and power of his personality, his keen 
appreciation of the temper of his audience, and, above 
all, in the fact that he never consented to make an 
address unless he had something he wanted to say. 
He was always vitally interested in getting his hearers 
to see the truth as he saw it, and to take a definite course 
of action. 

His preparation for a speech was always thorough, 
and for any occasion of importance, what he had to say 
was prepared, usually, several days beforehand, and 
always in time to have it sent to the newspapers of the 
country for simultaneous publication at the time of its 
delivery. In preparing addresses, especially political 
addresses or statements, he usually invited those who 
were in sympathy with him and whose criticisms and 
suggestions he desired to secure, to hear what he dictated 
as he dictated it, or to talk over with him a typewritten 
draft. For the many who at different times were thus 
called, it was always a delightful experience. 

I well remember the first time he ever sent for me. 
It was in connection with the address which he made in 



444 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

New York City, in Carnegie Hall, on the 20th day of 
March, 1912. I arrived at Sagamore Hill at dusk, during 
the first windy mutterings of a storm which later blew 
down trees and deluged with rain the entire countryside. 
The unlit hall was as dark as a pocket, and I did not 
realize that Colonel Roosevelt was beside me until 
I heard his quiet greeting, "I am very glad to see you, 
Dean." 

Together with a member of the New York Bar who 
had also been invited, we adjourned to the library. 
The afternoon tea came quickly, and for an hour the 
conversation turned on anything and everything except 
politics and the object which had brought us to Oyster 
Bay. Mrs. Roosevelt and the other members of the 
family being away, the Colonel was alone, but we all 
dressed for dinner, that being the invariable custom 
of the house. 

After dinner, the Colonel having disposed of a group 
of reporters then resident in the village, who had come 
out for their daily statement concerning matters affecting 
his campaign for the Republican nomination, we 
adjourned to his low-ceilinged study on the right-hand 
of the hallway as one entered the house. On opposite 
sides of this room were the Colonel's desk near the 
window and an oil painting of his father upon the wall. 

We found that the speech was already in manuscript 
form. I think the copy we used was the second or third 
revision. At any rate, the Colonel himself had already 
made numerous corrections in pencil. 

It is the experience of most persons called in by 
authors to criticise their manuscript that the real object 
for which they have been summoned is not to criticise, 
but to give the author the pleasure of hearing himself 



BOOKS AND SPEECHES 445 

read what he has written, the function of the supposed 
critics being usually akin to that of the claqueur at the 
theater. But no one ever had this experience with 
Colonel Roosevelt. When the Colonel asked you to 
criticise, he meant what he said, and no author ever 
took criticisms and suggestions more freely. But to this 
amenability to criticism there was one important lim- 
itation. You could not help him unless you thoroughly 
understood the main things he had determined to say, 
and why he had determined to say them. He did not 
want you to debate with him the wisdom of these funda- 
mental things. He would refuse to debate them. What 
he wanted was not to be told what to say, but to be 
helped how to say it. 

With this limitation, my experience was that he 
accepted criticism too readily. Often after the prelim- 
inary draft of an address or statement had been submitted 
to a group, I felt that his almost too ready acceptance 
of suggestions and criticisms had, in many instances, 
failed to improve the production as a whole. This will- 
ingness to accept criticism and take suggestions caused 
me, I remember, much difficulty on this particular 
evening. I liked the address as he had written it, and 
had only a few suggestions to make. The lawyer from 
New York, on the other hand, wanted a considerable 
number of modifications, and I soon found myself, 
as on other occasions, contending for the forms of expres- 
sions originally used. 

He read the typewritten sheets aloud, not minding 
the least if one or the other of us interrupted him before 
he had completed a single sentence. When, some time 
after twelve o'clock, we had apparently reached the 
end, he said: "I shall have to sit up and go over this 



446 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

again tonight, because it must go to the newspapers 
tomorrow to insure its publication on the morning 
after I make the address. But before you go to bed I 
should like to read you a concluding paragraph which 
I have written. This is what I feel I want to say." 

From the drawer of the desk he took several soiled 
pieces of gray tissue manuscript, on which he had written 
in pencil. The light from the single lamp shone on the 
desk and was reflected on his face, the rest of the room 
was dark save for the fitful light from a dying fire, out- 
side the fierce storm lashed against the windows, as he 
read to us the final paragraph of this — one of the greatest 
of his speeches — a paragraph which, when delivered 
a few nights later, brought a vast audience to its feet, 
and when published stirred the hearts of millions of 
his fellow countrymen. 

They were great words, and praise would have belittled 
them. When his voice ceased we rose and, with a simple 
good-bye, left him and passed out into the night. 




Pack Bros. 

SAGAMORE HILL 

In this beautiful but simple home at Oyster Bay, Long Island, overlooking 
the waters of Long Island Sound, Theodore Roosevelt spent the major portion 
< f his life. At Oyster Bay, Roosevelt played as a boy, especially during the sum- 
mer months. At Sagamore Hill, he lived the year round, after retiring from the 
Presidency in 1908. 




Paul Thompson, N. Y. 

TROPHY ROOM AT SAGAMORE HILL 

In this room arc gathered a few of the more than ten thousand specimens 
which Colonel Roosevelt gathered on his African hunting trip. The bulk of the 
splendid collection went to the Smithsonian Institution at Washingl 



CHAPTER XXIX 

Life at Sagamore Hill 

ROOSEVELT'S family life was as intense as his 
public life. His wife and children and home 
were next to his heart, together with his country. 
He believed that the strength of the nation lay in the 
tenderness and in the fine love of American parents and 
children for one another, and in his own life he practiced 
his belief. 

Unlike many public men, his home was not only a 
place for rest and recreation; it was his workshop too. 
In it were gathered all those whom he loved best, and 
in it his greatest labor was performed. Most men have 
one place for home and another for work, but he was 
able to bring both beneath a single roof. This was of 
course true while he was at the White House. It was 
true, too, of his later years at his home at Sagamore 
Hill. True, he had an office in the city, at first with the 
Outlook — afterwards with the Metropolitan, and during 
the last six months with the New York office of the 
Kansas City Star, and he went to town one or more days 
a week, depending on the work that for the time engaged 
his attention. He attended to considerable corre- 
spondence, did some work and saw many people, both 
for their convenience and his own, at his office, but, 
nevertheless, his home remained the center of his working 
life as well as the center of his family life. 

The daily routine at Sagamore Hill was regulated by 
the owner's habits of work. Breakfast was not always 

(447) 



448 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

an early meal, as Roosevelt often worked late, sometimes 
until after midnight. On the night I went over his 
Carnegie Hall speech with him, I left him at one o'clock 
in the morning, but he remained at his desk until four, 
going over the manuscript. In the morning he might 
take a hard canter, a good walk or chop wood for an 
hour or more, but more often, breakfast over, he would 
plunge into his correspondence. The fact that at the 
White House he could keep abreast of his letters so 
that each one was replied to on the day of its receipt was 
sufficiently wonderful, but it was still more extraordinary 
that as a private citizen with necessarily less absolute 
command of his time than when he was President and 
without unlimited clerical resources, with all the work 
that the did, he could keep abreast, day by day, with 
his enormous correspondence. 

Unless the day had been reserved for some family 
expedition or for some particular or serious piece of work, 
about 10:30 the guests began to arrive. These always 
came by appointment. No public man has ever been 
more insistent upon and has more successfully main- 
tained his own and his family's right of privacy. When 
he was in the White House, as we have seen, there were 
hours when practically any American citizen could call 
on him and he would interrupt his morning's work to 
shake by the hand dozens of persons who merely came 
to see the President. But Sagamore Hill was not the 
White House. It was the home of a private citizen, and 
curiosity seekers were not encouraged. Even his intimate 
friends, respecting the conditions arising out of the many 
claims up^on his time, rarely came to Oyster Bay without 
by note or telephone giving him an opportunity to arrange 
an hour convenient to him. 



LIFE AT SAGAMORE HILL 449 

But those who did come by appointment were not few. 
In the course of a single year their numbers ran into the 
hundreds and their occupations were just as varied as the 
interests of the man they came to see. "You certainly 
meet all sorts of people at Cousin Theodore's," said one 
of his younger relatives. This remark, I think, probably 
represents the attitude of most of his guests towards their 
fellow guests. Each saw people he was not apt to meet 
anywhere else. The guests were not always glad to see 
each other. Often two or more would come, each filled 
w r ith his own errand, and wanting much of his host's 
time. As the trains do not run every few minutes from 
New York to Oyster Bay, and as all who wanted to see 
him could not come out from the city by automobile, it 
not infrequently happened that several persons were 
given an appointment at the same hour and arrived 
on the same train. I have more than once been amused 
at the expression of annoyance unconsciously manifested 
on the face of a guest who, on arriving at the station at 
Oyster Bay, found three or more others bound for Saga- 
more Hill. Their efforts to be polite, or, if known to each 
other, to simulate cordiality, were painful to them and 
entertaining to the onlooker. The morning batch of 
guests seen and their business attended to, the hour of 
luncheon would usually bring still others. 

A luncheon at Sagamore Hill might contain as varied 
an assortment of guests as at the White House, when 
he was President, but by three o'clock or shortly after 
the guests were usually gone. 

The next two hours were devoted to Mrs. Roosevelt. 

They would walk or ride or row together. All his 

appointments were arranged to keep these hours open. 

Absolutely congenial in their tastes; dependent on each 

20 



450 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

other, neither was dependent on people. They loved 
to go off alone together. 

This lack of dependence on people was one of Roose- 
velt's marked traits which affected all the arrangements 
and the conduct of his home. He liked to meet interest- 
ing people. He had literally hundreds of warm personal 
friends. He was full of humor, loved to tell and hear 
good stories and, most of all, loved to exchange ideas with 
persons who sympathized with his own view-point 
towards the subject under discussion. But to spend an 
entire day talking, even with his friends, was for him 
impossible. The newspapers never had occasion to 
inform the American people that Colonel and Mrs. 
Roosevelt had gone to Palm Beach or other popular 
resort for a few days' or weeks" rest. He once said to 
me, referring to a mutual friend, "His idea of rest is to 
go to a seaside resort and sit all day among a crowd 
of people on the hotel piazza. I can not understand it." 
Such a rest would have been torture to him. His relaxa- 
tion was to go with Mrs. Roosevelt, alone, or with the 
children on an all-day row or ride and picnic. The 
country around Sagamore Hill and the shores of the 
bay and sound afforded hundreds of interesting objective 
points for such expeditions. 

The walk or the ride over, there was tea in the famous 
North Room, to which came all the members of the family 
and their guests; also, not infrequently, those who came 
from New York to dine or spend the night. 

After he became President, he and Mrs. Roosevelt 
never went out to dinner except to his cousin's, Mr. W. 
Emlen Roosevelt, who owns the adjoining place. Indeed, 
the only place of assembly that he habitually frequented 
was his Lodge. The members were the village people — 



LIFE AT SAGAMORE HILL 451 

the storekeepers, gardeners, superintendents of the coun- 
try places. Here he had an opportunity to study the 
hopes, trials, needs and the aspirations of the people. 
He therefore grew to know the life and the point of view 
of all classes in the little village, and many of his ideas on 
the improvement of country life came from this first- 
hand and intimate knowledge. If he seldom went to 
see his neighbors, they came to see him. He was an 
adviser of the entire community. The smallest child, 
the mother, the head of the family, the worker, all 
came to him with their troubles and their problems, and 
never found him too busy to take a real interest and 
give them such help and advice as he could. 

On Sunday afternoons, when his children were young, 
he would take them walking, and with them also would 
go the cousins who lived in the neighboring houses. At 
one time there were as many as sixteen children, alto- 
gether. Roosevelt loved children, and they adored him. 
When I asked Mrs. Langdon Warner, one of the sixteen 
now grown up, with children of her own, what most 
attracted her, as a child, to her cousin, she said: "He 
was always perfectly just and fair. He had no favorites 
and as few rules as possible. On these walks we would 
race and wade and climb. We children, however, were 
expected, within reason, to protect ourselves. If there 
was a slip in climbing a tree because both hands were not 
used, home we went. Hands were made to be used, and 
a child must learn how to use them. If we waded in a 
brook and fell, home we went again. In this way we 
learned how to take care of ourselves, and we never 
regarded the punishment which was the consequence 
of our clumsiness as unfair." 

Occasionally there would be point-to-point walks with 



452 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

the children, like his walks with the grown-ups along 
Rock Creek in Washington. A distant point would be 
selected and he and the other children would make a 
bee-line for it, swimming ponds, wading brooks, scram- 
bling up rocks and pushing through bushes until the object 
was reached. On one of these occasions, when one of the 
cousins returned home with wet, mud-covered and torn 
dress, her mother meted out punishment. On the child's 
protesting that "Cousin Theodore took them," the indig- 
nant mother replied, "I don't care. You must not be a 
fool, even if your Cousin Theodore sets you the example." 

This love for children never flagged. Had he lived, 
no doubt his grandchildren, when old enough, would 
have taken point-to-point walks with their grandfather. 
"The first time he came to breakfast with me," writes 
Mr. Thomas Robins, "my small boy was brought into 
the hall to see him. A gathering of prominent men was 
awaiting him in the drawing-room. I had come in with 
the Colonel and was taking off my overcoat while he 
spoke to the child. Suddenly, to my surprise, I saw 
the boy and the Colonel streaking up the first flight, 
evidently bound for the nursery. I puffed after them 
and when I reached the third floor, found the Colonel and 
the boy, side by side, stretched out on the floor, partici- 
pating in the operation of a miniature electric railway. 

"'That's right, Tommy, safety first,' he was saying 
to the child as I entered. 

"The two boys were working the toy together and 
were equally oblivious of the fact that a goodly company 
was waiting below to meet the greatest man of the age. 
That child always spoke of the Colonel afterward as 
my friend. 

"He loved everything that associated him with youth, 



LIFE AT SAGAMORE HILL 453 

everything that kept him young. Soon after he came 
back from South America, I made a short journey with 
him. He had not got over his jungle fever and was 
having a bout with temperature every afternoon. I 
ventured a retrospective remonstrance. 

"'What on earth, Colonel, has a man of your age to 
do with explorations, anyway?" 

"'Youth will be served, Tom,' was his answer. 'It 
was my last chance to be a boy.*" 

Roosevelt was happy in owning a home which was 
peculiarly adapted to enable him to lead the kind of 
life as a private citizen for which he was best suited. 
It was near enough to New York to enable h,im to reach 
that city in less than two hours by train or automobile. 
He could therefore go to town without spending the 
night, and people could come to see him and return during 
the morning or afternoon. Yet Oyster Bay was far 
enough out of New York and away from any line of 
travel to discourage anyone from calling upon him who 
was not willing to make a special and considerable 
effort. Though that part of the shore of Long Island 
Sound is taken up by places of the well-to-do, his home 
was not in the suburbs — it was thoroughly in the country, 
and all Roosevelt's pleasures were of the kind that 
needed fields and woods and open spaces. In his "Auto- 
biography" he tells us, "At Sagamore Hill we love a 
great many things — birds and trees and books and all 
things beautiful, and horses and rifles and children and 
hard work and the joy of life. We have great fireplaces 
and in them the logs roar and crackle during the long 
winter evenings. The big piazza is for the hot, still after- 
noons of summer." You can feel the affection for his 
home in every line. 



454 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

The place contains about eighty acres. The visitor 
approaches the house from the main road which runs 
along the shore of Oyster Bay, by a fairly steep drive. 
The house itself is on the top of the hill, overlooking 
the Sound and surrounded by lawns and fields, and 
screened from the neighboring houses by belts of woods. 
Roosevelt purchased the place and built the main part 
of the house in the early eighties. The North Room 
was added while he was President. This North Room, 
which is the most charming feature of the ground floor, 
is reached from the end of the hall farthest from the 
entrance by descending a few steps. It is a large, high- 
ceilinged room, much lived in and thoroughly homelike, 
with a great fireplace inviting intimate talk among friends 
and the chat which comes with afternoon tea. Certainly 
there is nothing about the room which ever suggested 
its use for stiff and formal conversation — though it has 
been the scene of some of the most momentous political 
conferences in the history of the United States. 

Roosevelt received many gifts from all sorts of people. 
The house is filled with interesting things from every 
corner of the earth, given him by kings and emperors and 
dowager empresses, as well as by foreign universities and 
cities. There are other things which, because of personal 
association, their owner treasured more, such as a 
Remington bronze, "The Bronco Buster," given him 
by the Rough Riders, and Proctor's "Cougar, "the gift 
of the Tennis Cabinet. There are also great elephant 
tusks and other trophies of his hunting trips. But the 
house is not a museum; it is a home. The living room is 
a place to live in, not to gaze at curios. There are 
some heads of wild animals, but, unlike the homes of 
other hunters I have known, the guest does not eat his 



LIFE AT SAGAMORE HILL 455 

meals under the staring glass eyes of rows of dead beasts. 
In short, it is exactly the kind of home that those who 
knew him well would expect to find — the home of a 
simple, quiet, cultivated gentleman. 

There may still be left a few persons who obtained 
their ideas of Roosevelt from newspapers bitterly hostile 
to him politically, or who only saw him as he stood on 
the rear platform of a train during an exciting campaign. 
These may still have the impression that he was always 
slapping people on the back and declaring that he was 
"delighted," or at least that he was a boisterous and 
familiar person whose animal spirits pervaded his inter- 
course with others at the expense of good taste and 
sometimes of good manners. Nothing could be further 
from the real facts. Roosevelt had strong feelings. He 
often acted vigorously and spoke emphatically. Even 
in dictating a letter to his secretary, if he had something 
which he wished to put strongly, he would accompany 
the dictation with an emphatic bang of his fist on the 
table or the arm of his chair. But those who came as 
his guests to Sagamore Hill never failed to be impressed 
not only with the warmth but with the dignity of his 
welcome. 

While always uniformally courteous and unassuming, 
there was a dignity in his intercourse which prevented 
familiarity by any except life-long, close personal friends. 
He had many intimate friends whom he called by their 
first names, but unless they had known him practically 
all their lives, and were of the same age, they rarely 
spoke of him or to him as "Theodore." On a campaign, 
when he was addressing large crowds, there were often 
frequent shouts of "Teddy." This he did not mind; 
indeed, he liked it, but I have never seen a man bold 



456 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

enough, when meeting hhn, to call him "Teddy." There 
was something about his personality which prevented 
even the thought of that kind of familiarity. I have 
never known him to listen to a questionable story, and 
I have some doubt whether anyone ever had the hardi- 
hood to tell him one. Part of this dignity arose from his 
innate self-respect, as well as from his courteous con- 
sideration of others. It was also due to the fact that 
in many respects he was an old-fashioned gentleman 
with the punctilious manners of an elder day. This was 
especially marked in his relations with women. 

After the death of his friend Dr. J. William White, he 
always stayed, when in Philadelphia, with Mr. Thomas 
Robins. In a letter referring to some of his character- 
istics, Mr. Robins says: 

"It is true of him that on the social side he was a 
stand-patter. His dress was always in the fashion of the 
early eighties, when he was a novice in politics. He 
never changed the cut of his clothes with the change in 
fashion. His household was regulated after the manner 
of the well-to-do forty years ago. He liked to come to 
Philadelphia because he found life here more like that in 
which he had grown up. He used to talk and write to 
me of earlier days, when he frequently visited Mrs. 
Roosevelt's uncle, George Tyler, and of the marvelous 
home-cooking in that hospitable mansion — now pulled 
down — at Fifteenth and Walnut Streets. He was wont 
to say that he liked the way in which our food was served, 
undisguised by the art of the chef. 

'"When I dine out in New York,' he said to me once, 
'potatoes look like flowers and the ice cream looks like 
foliage. I can't distinguish the food from the landscape." 

"It was evident that he liked the ways of the last 



LIFE AT SAGAMORE HILL 457 

generation and its absence of 'side.' After the death of a 
friend in Philadelphia with whom he had spent some 
days at different times, he wrote to me: 

'"In an age which even its upholders must admit to 
be rather blatantly vulgar, it was a comfort to go to his 
house and see its dear mistress and master and feel, 
down to the least detail, the sense of refinement and of 
living with Old School gentlefolk.' 

"On the other hand, he would not compromise with 
his dignity to gratify imaginary prejudices of the plain 
people against the formalities of life that were the habits 
and traditions of his kind. 'I shall wear evening clothes,' 
he said about a speech he was to make after dining with 
me, adding whimsically, 'controlling any desire I may 
have to go Jim Corbett one better in the matter of orna- 
mental finery.'" 

His courtesy came not merely from his social training, 
but from his heart. It extended, not only to his personal 
associates, but to all the members of his friends" house- 
holds. He always remembered the names of the servants, 
and if they were from French-speaking countries his 
little word at parting was spoken in their own language, 
with a warm' handshake. Nothing gave him greater 
concern than that he might unconsciously have shown 
some lack of consideration for others. Once he came to 
Philadelphia to deliver a lecture on his Brazilian experi- 
ences. Through an unfortunate accident, he was twenty 
minutes late. The fact that he had shown an apparent, 
though wholly unintentional discourtesy, so disturbed 
him that it affected his entire lecture, which lacked 
something of his usual punch. "I have never in my life 
heard a cruel word from his lips," one of his relatives 
once said to me: "He dislikes and despises many people, 



458 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

but even when he wants to annihilate them, he is never 
mean or cruel or petty about it." 

No one could go to Sagamore Hill without realizing 
in some degree the air of happiness that pervaded his 
home. "There are many forms of triumph," he said, 
"but there is no other success that in any shape or 
way approaches that which is open to most of the many, 
many men and women who have the right ideals. These 
are the men and the women who see that it is the intimate 
and homely things that count most. They are the men 
and women who have the courage to strive for the happi- 
ness which comes only with labor, effort and self-sacrifice, 
and only to those whose joy in life springs in part from 
power of work and sense of duty." To all who knew 
and loved him it is an infinite satisfaction to know that 
the "homely things that count most" were his in fullest 
measure. 




Fkolo by Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 

HOLDING HIS YOUNGEST GRANDCHILD 

The family life of Theodore Roosevelt was a model for the American people. 
In this family group, the last taken before his death, he is holding his youngest 
grandchild. In the foreground is the service flag showing the war record of three 
brave sons. This photograph was taken before the youngest son entered the 
service. Quentin's golden star has been added since. 



CHAPTER XXX 

The World War — His Last Great Service 

THE great war began on July 28, 1914. It brought 
to Roosevelt the opportunity for his last great 
service to his country. From the beginning of 
hostilities in Europe until the signing of the armistice 
on November 11, 1918, he never ceased calling upon 
America to prepare for the inevitable struggle, and when 
that struggle came, to push it through to a successful 
conclusion. 

In the early days of the war, the most important 
question for this country was the question raised by 
Germany's invasion of Belgium. In the Outlook of 
September 23d, Roosevelt first wrote of this, expressly 
stating that in this article he did not intend to 
pass judgment upon Germany. He advocated the 
maintenance of American neutrality but was careful 
not to express himself with regard to the propriety or 
duty of protesting officially against the invasion of 
Belgium. At the time of this public statement he was 
anxious to do nothing which might embarrass the 
President, and he therefore put in writing only a part 
of what he really had in mind. In conferences with his 
fellow-editors of the Outlook, and in a private talk with 
one of the staff of the Kansas City Star, he made it plain 
that in his opinion, good morals and good Americanism 
demanded a protest against the violation of Belgium in 
contravention of the Hague Treaty. 

A year and a half later at the Republican State 

(459) 



460 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Convention in New York City, Elihu Root criticised the 
President for his failure to send a stern protest to Ger- 
many when Belgium was first invaded. At the Demo- 
cratic Convention a few days later, ex-Governor Glynn 
answered Root by a counter-attack upon Roosevelt, who 
was by this time generally regarded as the foremost 
Republican critic of the Administration. Glynn pro- 
duced with delight Roosevelt's Outlook article of Sep- 
tember, 1914, and quoted from it certain isolated passages 
which seemed to indicate that at that time the Colonel 
did not favor sending a protest in the Belgium matter. 
But Glynn's address, although it afforded comfort to 
himself and to his hearers, was not based upon the 
complete facts. Roosevelt, with his strong conviction 
that a protest against the Belgium outrage should have 
been lodged at once, had been careful not to preclude 
himself from later stating this conviction. In the course 
of this article he had said: "Neutrality may be of prime 
necessity to maintain peace, .... but we pay the 
penalty of this action on behalf of peace for ourselves, 
and possibly for others in the future, by forfeiting our 
right to do anything on behalf of peace for the Belgians 
at present." Although he did not yet say so in public, 
he believed that our right to protest the rape of Belgium 
was also our duty. 

The testimony of Mr. Lawrence F. Abbott, one of 
the editors of the Outlook, shows conclusively that he 
was convinced at the time that the protest should be 
made, although he refrained from making any public 
declaration on the matter, in order to leave the President 
as free a hand as possible. His real conviction in the 
matter appears in a subsequent statement made when 
he felt that circumstances justified him in breaking silence: 



HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 461 

"I feel in the strongest way that we should have inter- 
fered, at least to the extent of the most emphatic diplo- 
matic protest and at the very outset — and then by what- 
ever further action was necessary — in regard to the 
violation of the neutrality of Belgium; for this act was 
the earliest and the most important and, in its conse- 
quences, the most ruinous of all the violations and 
offenses against treaties committed by any combatant 
during the war." 

The Lusitania was sunk on May 7, 1915. She was 
torpedoed without warning and carried with her to then- 
graves 1,153 souls, of whom 114 were Americans. In an 
instant the country was ablaze from end to end. Roose- 
velt two days later made a public statement through the 
press, in which he charged that "for many months our 
government has preserved between right and wrong a 
neutrality which would have excited the emulous admira- 
tion of Pontius Pilate — the arch-typical neutral of all 
time." He spoke with intense indignation of the crime 
itself and of the frightful wrongs which had been com- 
mitted in Belgium and concluded: "Unless we act with 
immediate decision and vigor we shall have failed in the 
duty demanded by humanity at large, and demanded 
even more clearly by the self-respect of the American 
Republic." 

On the next day the President delivered an address 
to a body of newly naturalized citizens in Convention 
Hall, Philadelphia. The nation was waiting breathlessly 
for a pronouncement on the issue raised by the Lusitania. 
The President made no reference to the Lusitania, but 
he made one statement which amazed and perplexed 
millions of his fellow-citizens. With the death cries of 
American men, women and children ringing in their ears 



462 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

they read the President's words: "There is such a thing 
as a man being too proud to fight. There is such a thing 
as a nation being so right that it does not need to convince 
others by force that it is right." 

It is not hard to imagine what Roosevelt's feelings 
must have been when he read this speech, and how he 
must have longed to resume, if only for an hour, the 
powers of the presidency. But he was powerless, except 
to utter his thoughts, and in doing this he had ceased to 
attempt any concealment of his feelings. He had a 
perfectly definite conviction as to what ought to be done: 
"Without twenty-four hours' delay this country should 
and could take effective action. It should take possession 
of all the interned German ships, including the German 
warships, and hold them as a guarantee that ample 
satisfaction shall be given us. Furthermore it should 
declare that in view of Germany's murderous offenses 
against the rights of neutrals all commerce with Germany 
shall be forthwith forbidden and all commerce of every 
kind permitted and encouraged with France, England, 
Russia, and the rest of the civilized world. 

"I do not believe that the firm assertion of our rights 
means war, but, in any event, it is well to remember 
there are things worse than war." 

Thereafter he condemned again and again the Ad- 
ministration's inaction and the policy of note-writing 
which had been resorted to. To the end of his life he 
was firmly persuaded that instant action of the kind 
which he had advocated at the time was the imperative 
duty of the nation. Instead of that, he said, "for two 
years after the Lusitania was sunk, we continued to fawn 
on the blood-stained murderers of our people, we were 
false to ourselves and we were false to the cause of right 



HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 463 

and of liberty and democracy throughout the world. 
Had we done our duty when the Lusitania was sunk, 
instead of following the advice of the apostles of greedy 
and peaceable infamy, the World War with its dreadful 
slaughter would long ago have been over." 

As time went on, his controversy with the Adminis- 
tration became more and more acute. On August 25, 
1915, he addressed the Reserve Officers' Training Camp 
at Piatt sburg, N. Y., at the invitation of Major-General 
Leonard Wood. He spoke with indignation of the exist- 
ing American policy with respect to Mexico, saying, "we 
have treated elocution as a substitute for action." Again 
he condemned our failure to protest the invasion of 
Belgium which he said it was our bounden duty to do, 
and asserted that for thirteen months America had 
played an ignoble part among the nations. After the 
speech he told the reporters that he did not consider 
that the President was entitled to popular support except 
in so far as he justified that support by a proper regard 
for the welfare of the country. 

This speech made a tremendous stir. Lindley 
Garrison, the Secretary of War, publicly reproved General 
Wood for having permitted Roosevelt to make it, and 
the Colonel thereupon took up the cudgels in his friend's 
behalf and assumed entire responsibility for what he 
had said. He reminded the Secretary that his speech 
was advertised long in advance and that if the Adminis- 
tration had not wished him to speak they could have 
denied him permission to do so. This turned Garrison's 
attack upon Roosevelt with a statement that it was not 
his duty to follow the Colonel up and prevent him from 
making indiscreet speeches. This answer, which begged 
the issue, was phrased in a semi- jocose style which the 



4G4 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

Colonel characterized as "buffoonery," and thus the 
controversy ended. But Roosevelt's speech was not 
forgotten and marked the real beginning of his acknowl- 
edged leadership among those who wished to see the 
United States take her rightful place among the nations. 

In his message to Congress in December, 1915, the 
President came out tentatively for preparedness; but his 
proposal was coolly received by Congress and by the coun- 
try and for the time he did not press the matter further. 
Roosevelt, however, never varied in his attitude. He 
had no patience whatever with talk when it took the 
place of action. On May 19, 1916, in a speech at Detroit 
he said: "We first hysterically announced that we would 
not prepare because we were afraid that preparation 
might make us lose our vantage-ground as a peace-loving 
people. Then we became frightened and announced 
loudly that we ought to prepare; that the world was on 
fire; that our own national structure was in danger of 
catching aflame; and that we must immediately make 
ready. Then we turned another somersault and aban- 
doned all talk of preparedness ; and we never did anything 
more than talk." 

For more than two years after the outbreak of the 
war Roosevelt continued, without ceasing, to advocate 
preparation for the part which he saw that we were 
bound to play. He was eager to see the army and navy 
strengthened and made ready, and he was just as eager to 
induce in his fellow-countrymen that heroic mood which 
would fit them for the sacrifice of war. The conflict was 
not one of small trained armies, as in the past, but of 
peoples. If the United States were to enter it, every 
citizen would have to take his part. Every man capable 
of bearing arms would be called upon to give himself 



HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 465 

to his country. For this reason Roosevelt strenuously 
urged universal military training, which should be built 
upon the Swiss system, and should be as democratic as 
it is possible for military training to be. 

At the beginning of his campaign for preparedness 
he was treated as a jingo, scoffed at and ignored. But 
his conviction was founded upon a rock. If the United 
States were to endure without a blow the wrongs and 
humiliations heaped upon her and upon other civilized 
nations by the German empire, her position in the world 
family would be gone forever. The foremost duty of 
this government, as of every government, was to protect 
the lives and welfare of its own citizens. These could 
never be secure unless the United States should arm 
and should join with the Allies in the vindication of 
human rights. At first Roosevelt was almost single- 
handed in his insistence that we should make ready for 
the struggle and in his advocacy of universal military 
training, but gradually his voice began to awake an echo 
from the heart of America, as it had so often done before. 
Our spiritual preparedness for war when it came to us 
was due to him more than to any other one man. The 
widespread acceptance of the principle of universal mili- 
tary training was a tribute to the power of his leadership. 

On April 6th came the declaration of war. Shortly, 
thereafter, Roosevelt called upon the President to express 
his approval and his desire to cooperate to the greatest 
possible extent in the Administration's war program. 

He was eager to see our men immediately on the firing 
line in Europe. "Let us," he said to the citizens of 
Chicago, "put the flag at the front now, at the earliest 
moment, and not merely announce that we are going 
to fight a year or two hence." Nor did he confine 
so 



466 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

himself to urging other men to fight for their country. 
He was desperately anxious to go himself. As far back 
as the spring of 1915, when the Lusiiania was sunk, he 
had conceived the idea of raising a volunteer division 
for immediate service at the front as soon as it should 
be needed. In the summer of 1916 the project assumed 
more definite shape and he began to receive tremendous 
floods of applications from those who wished to go. 

When at last war came in fact, though not in name, 
on January 31, 1917, Roosevelt was ready. On February 
2d he wrote the Secretary of War renewing his offer to 
raise a division, and asking to be notified if the probability 
of war would compel his cancellation of a proposed trip 
to Jamaica. Mr. Baker answered immediately that no 
situation had arisen which would justify him in suggesting 
a postponement of the trip; but on the day of his answer 
diplomatic relations with Germany were severed and 
Roosevelt immediately abandoned the idea of going to 
Jamaica. 

Instead he wrote to Baker again urging the War 
Department to furnish him with facilities for the raising 
of his division. Then ensued a correspondence extending 
over some weeks. Baker took the position that such a 
volunteer force could not be raised without permission 
of Congress. Roosevelt continually pressed his request 
with a statement that he would "of course ask no favors 
of any kind except that the division be put in the fighting 
line at the earliest possible moment." 

When war was actually declared, Baker and Roosevelt 
conferred together in regard to the matter and Roosevelt 
repeated his request. Again Baker refused on the 
ground that the War College Division of the General 
Staff had advised him that the best professional soldiers 



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HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 467 

should first be retained in this country to train troops, 
and should subsequently command any expedition which 
might be sent to Europe. After a final refusal by Baker, 
Congress passed the Draft Act in which they authorized 
the President to accept volunteer troops of the kind 
which Roosevelt was anxious to raise. Thereupon he 
telegraphed to the President on May 18th asking for 
permission to raise two divisions for immediate service 
at the front and announcing himself ready to raise four 
divisions if the President should so direct. 

Wilson's answ T er to this was a public statement in 
which he explained that the plan was rejected for purely 
military reasons. He also sent Roosevelt a telegram, 
in which he stated that his conclusions "were based 
entirely upon imperative considerations of public policy 
and not upon personal or private choice." There was 
nothing to do but to give up the idea entirely and to 
release the 300,000 and more men who had volunteered 
for service. All of the volunteers were men who would 
have been exempt from draft, and included such men 
as Seth Bullock, Henry L. Stimson, Taft's Secretary 
of War, James R. Garfield and Raymond Robbins. 
Roosevelt issued a statement addressed to all his volun- 
teers, in which he deplored their inability to go together 
and in which he emphatically and indignantly repudiated 
the suggestion that any motives of personal or political 
advantage had actuated him. 

Thus he failed to achieve his heart's desire. Although 
he was represented in the fighting forces by his four 
sons, the youngest of whom gave his life for his country, 
he could not be content with this kind of vicarious sacrifice. 
There is no doubt that the moral effect would have been 
tremendous had he been permitted to carry out his plan. 



468 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

His personal popularity, not only in this country but 
in Great Britain and France, coupled with the addition 
of his men to the fighting line long before any American 
soldiers, other than the regulars, could be placed there, 
would have been a mighty inspiration to the morale of the 
hard-pressed Allies. 

But if he were to be denied the service which he 
most craved, he was still determined to do all that he 
could behind the lines. His insistent desire to take troops 
immediately to the front helped to impress upon the 
American people the vital necessity of getting soldiers 
to Europe without the loss of a day. He was the Ad- 
ministration's most caustic critic if slackness or incom- 
petency appeared. He was boiling with impatience to 
see the day when an American army worthy of the 
name should face the Germans. Rhetoric in place of 
action stung him to madness. 

On June 7th, the Secretary of War stated in the 
Official Bulletin that there was "difficulty, disorder and 
confusion in getting things started, but it is a happy 
confusion. I delight in the fact that when we entered 
this war we were not, like our adversary, ready for it, 
anxious for it, prepared for it and inviting it. Accustomed 
to peace, we were not ready." We can well imagine 
what impression these words made upon Roosevelt's 
mind. Early in September, in commenting upon this 
statement, Roosevelt pointed to the deliberate failure to 
make any preparations until the actual formal declaration 
of war on April 6th, to the long-drawn squabble between 
the advocates of steel and wooden ships, and above 
all to the imperative necessity of throwing every human 
and material resource immediately into the military 
preparations before it should be too late. 




Underwood & Underwood, N. Y. 
Western Newspaper Union, Commitli 



Public Information, Arm 



t saociation. 



THE FOUR SOLDIER SONS OF COLONEL ROOSEVELT 

Upper left: Lieutenant-Colonel Theodore Roosevelt, Jr., U. S. A. Upper 
right: Captain Archibald Roosevelt, U. S. A. Lower left: Lieutenant Quentin 
Roosevelt, U. S. A. (killed in aerial battle, July 17, 1918). Lower right: Captain 
Kermit Roosevelt, British Army, Mesopotamian Expedition. 



HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 469 

Early in October of 1917, the Secretary of War was 
authoritatively quoted in the press as having said, "We 
are well on the way to the battlefront." At that time 
we had only reached the battlefront with one division, 
although a state of war had actually, if not officially, 
existed since January 31st. "For comparison with this 
kind of military activity," said Roosevelt, "we must go 
back to the days of Tiglath Pileser, Nebuchadnezzar and 
Pharaoh. The United States should adopt the stand- 
ards of speed in war which belong to the twentieth 
century A. D.; we should not be content and still less 
boast about standards which were obsolete in the seven- 
teenth century B. C." 

One newspaper referred to the country's development 
into "a powerful fighting machine." "To speak of a 
powerful fighting machine," said Roosevelt, "which after 
ten months is not ready to do any fighting, is a ludicrous 
contradiction in terms." Again and again in addresses 
throughout the country, in magazine articles and in 
conversation with his friends, he pointed out the differ- 
ence between words and action. He had no sympathy 
with that type of mind which, if it must strike, thinks to 
accomplish its end by striking softly. When war came 
he believed that all other considerations should give way, 
and that the last ounce of the nation's strength should 
be spent, if necessary, on the righteous cause which she 
had espoused. Not only his friends, but many who had 
been estranged from him by the political heart-burnings 
of the past few years, responded to his call. Before 
the war was for us many months old, he was the recog- 
nized leader of those who really desired the use of all our 
resources without reservation. 

In February, 1918, he underwent a painful minor 



470 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

operation at the Roosevelt Hospital in New York City. 
The operation was successful, but mastoiditis developed 
in his left ear at the same time, and for a few hours his 
condition was critical. For a little over a month he 
stayed at the hospital gradually recuperating and late 
in the winter was able to go back again to Oyster Bay. 

In the last week of March he spoke before the 
Republican State Convention at Portland, Maine, and 
after that from time to time made addresses urging a 
tireless prosecution of the war. But his health was not 
what it had been and the news of his son Quentin's 
death, which occurred July 17, 1918, was a very serious 
blow. He bravely went to the New York Republican 
State Convention in Saratoga the day after he received 
the news of his loss, but his heart was sore within him. 

Toward the end of October he spoke in Carnegie Hall 
in behalf of Governor Whitman and displayed his old 
fire and vigor. A few days later he made his last public 
appearance at a meeting in honor of a negro hospital unit. 
Then, on the very day of the armistice, inflammatory 
rheumatism compelled him to go back again to the 
Roosevelt Hospital. Happily he was released in time to 
spend his last Christmas at home with all the children 
and grandchildren who were able to come to Oyster Bay. 
After a happy holiday together they parted, and Colonel 
and Mrs. Roosevelt were left together. 

January 5th was spent in reading and writing at his 
home. He had been reviewing a book on pheasants by 
Beebe, the naturalist, and wrote the author a letter in 
regard to the details of the work. In the evening the 
American Defense Society held a concert in New York, 
which Roosevelt, as honorary president of the society, 
had been asked to attend. He was unable to go and so 




Underwood & Underwood, A'. Y. 

THE LAST PUBLIC APPEARANCE 

Photograph taken at the last public appearance of Colonel Theodore R< » ise- 
velt just before the serious illness which resulted in his death. The Colonel, 
clearly showing the effects of age and his recent bereavement, is wearing a mourn- 
ing band in memory of his son, Quentin, killed in an airplane battle over the 
German lines in July, 1918. 



HIS LAST GREAT SERVICE 471 

he sent a message — his last message to the American 
people. His brief letter ended with these words which 
epitomize his life's creed: "We have room for but one 
soul loyalty, and that is loyalty to the American people." 

He spent that evening with his family and went to 
bed at eleven o'clock. When he was ready for sleep he 
turned to his personal attendant, James Amos, and said, 
"Put out the light, please." They were the last words 
he was heard to utter. Shortly after four o'clock the 
next morning Amos, who was sleeping in the next room, 
noticed that the Colonel's breathing was unnatural. He 
hurried to fetch the trained nurse who was sleeping 
nearby, but when they reached Roosevelt's bedside 
they found that a clot of blood, settling upon a vital 
spot, had brought him peaceful death in sleep. 

His burial without pomp or circumstance was what 
he wished it to be. He and Mrs. Roosevelt had chosen 
a beautiful spot on a knoll looking over Long Island 
Sound for their last resting place. On January 8th a 
few members of the family gathered at his house and 
joined in a brief service of prayer. All of his children 
were there except Theodore and Kermit, who were 
fighting in Europe. The coffin was borne from the 
house draped with the Rough Riders' flags which he 
had loved so well, and was carried to the village of Oyster 
Bay. There, in the little Episcopal church where he 
and his family had worshipped for many years, were 
gathered the country's representatives and many of 
those who had been nearest to him in life. There was 
no music, no eulogy, only the time-honored words of 
prayer and consolation. 

As they left the church and came out upon the quiet 
spot where he was to lie, there stretched before them the 



472 THEODORE ROOSEVELT 

waters of the Sound, the woods and hills which he had 
roamed since boyhood, the trees which had grown with 
him — all the things of nature which he had loved so 
dearly all his life. It was a fitting place to leave him 
with a last farewell.' 

We who loved and trusted him will mourn his loss not 
only because our friend is gone, but because a great leader 
has been taken from us in the time of need. But we will 
rejoice for him that he was spared the further pain of 
severed friendships. Had he lived, he would surely 
have fought new battles and these might have opened 
again the wounds of six years before. He died when 
many of those wounds had been healed, and when many 
were friends again who for a time had been accounted 
foes. For four years he had labored for America in the 
time of her greatest danger, and had surrendered his 
own preferment for the common good. He reaped his 
reward; for before the end, the voice of faction had been 
stilled, and beside his grave constant friend and former 
foe alike united to do him honor. 



CHRONOLOGY 

(The numbers in parentheses indicate pages of the book.) 

1858, October 27. Born in New York City (27). 

1880, June 30. Graduated from Harvard University (51). 
October 27. Married Alice Hathaway Lee (51). 

1881, November 8. Elected to New York Legislature (56). 
1884, February 14. Death of his first wife (69). 

1886, November 2. Defeated for Mayor of New York (84). 

December 2. Married Edith Kermit Carow (193). 
1889, May 7. Appointed United States Civil Service Commis- 
sioner (84). 
1895, May 6. Appointed New York Police Commissioner (101). 

June 30. Sunday closing first enforced in New York (109). 

1897, April 6. Nominated Assistant Secretary of the Navy (119). 

1898, Februarv 25. Cable to Admiral Dewey (132). 

May 6* Appointed Lieutenant-Colonel First Volunteer 

Cavalry (135). 
June 24. Battle of Las Guasimas (143). 
July 1. Battle of San Juan Hill (144). 
November 8. Elected Governor (152). 

1899, January 2. Inaugurated as Governor (154). 
May 26. Signs Ford Franchise Bill (160). 

1900, June 21. Receives Republican Nomination for Vice-President 

(166). 
November 6. Elected Vice-President (168). 

1901, March 4. Takes office as Vice-President (168). 
September 14. Succeeds McKinley as President (171). 

1902, June 17. Reclamation Act (289). 
June 28. Isthmian Canal Act (219). 
October 15. Coal Strike Settled (203). 

December 31. Settlement of Venezuela matter (211). 

1903, January 24. Alaskan Boundary Matter referred to Com- 

mission (214). 
February 14. Department of Commerce and Labor Act (274J. 
February 19. Elkins Rebate Act (245). 
November 6. Recognition of Panama (225). 
November 18. Convention with Panama (225). 
December 17. Reciprocity Treaty with Cuba (210). 

1904, February 23. Treaty with Panama ratified by Senate (227). 
June 23. Receives Republican nomination for President (230). 
November 8. Elected President (233). 

1905, February 1. Act Creating U. S. Forest Service (292). 
March 4. Inaugurated as President (235). 

(473) 



474 CHRONOLOGY 

1905, June 8. Notes to Japan and Russia (238). 
August 5. Meeting of Peace Delegates (239). 
September 5. Signing of Russo-Japanese Treaty (241). 

1906, June 11. Forest-Homestead Act (291). 
June 29. Hepburn Rate Act (247). 

June 29. Act authorizing lock canal at Panama (227). 
June 30. Food and Drugs Act (247). 

1907, February 25. Convention with Santo Domingo ratified by 

Senate (213). 
March 14. Appoints Inland Waterways Commission (296). 
November 4. Tennessee Coal and Iron Conference (281). 
December 16. Fleet starts around the world (267). 

1908, April 22. Employers' Liability Act (247). 

1909, February 22. Fleet returns (272). 
March 4. Presidential term expires (301). 
March 23. Sails for Africa (301). 

April 22. Starts into the African wilderness (302). 

1910, March 14. Arrives at Khartoum (311). 
June 1. Speech at Guildhall, London (317). 
June 18. Returns to New York (317). 
August 31. Ossawatomie speech (329). 

1912, February 10. Letter from the seven Governors (334-5). 
February 21. Columbus, Ohio, speech (338). 
February 25. Announces candidacy for nomination (335). 
March 20. Carnegie Hall speech (344). 

June 15. Goes to Chicago (355). 

June 22. His supporters at Convention leave Republican 

Party (360). 
August 7. Nominated by Progressive Party (377). 
October 14. Shot at Milwaukee by John Schrank (380). 
November 5. Defeated by Woodrow Wilson (382). 

1913, May 31. Verdict in Newett Libel Case (419). 
October 14. Leaves for South America (401). 

1914, February 27. Starts down the River of Doubt (408). 
April 15. Arrives at civilization again (413). 

May 19. Returns to New York (415). 
June 30. Address at Pittsburgh (415). 

1915, May 7. Statement on Lusitania sinking (462). 
May 22. Verdict in Barnes Libel Case (420). 
August 25. Address at Plattsburgh (463). 

1916, June 10. Second nomination by Progressives (425). 
June 26. Withdraws to support Hughes (427). 

1917, February 2. Offers Volunteer Division (466). 
May 21. Disbands Volunteer Division (467). 

1919, January 6. Death (471). 



INDEX 



Abbott, Edwin H., 371. 

Abbott, Lawrence F., 460. 

Abbott, Lyman, 417. 

Addams, Miss Jane, 314. 370, 377. 

Africa, Hunting Trip in (Chapter 

XX), 301. 
Ahlwardt (Anti- Jewish Preacher), 108 
Alaskan Boundary question, 214. 
Aldrich, Senator, 321, 326. 
Alger. Russell A., 134. 
American Sugar Refining Co., Fraud 

of, 280 et seq. 
American Tobacco Company, 275. 
Amos. James, 471. 
Andrews, Avery D., 101, 154. 
Andrews, Justice, 420. 
Anthracite Coal Strike of 1902, 198 et seq. 
Appointments, Theory and Practice as 

to, 254 et seq. 
Arthur, Chester A.. 85, 119, 173, 229. 
Assistant Secretary of the Navy (Chapter 

VIII), 119 et seq. 

Bacon, Robert. 46, 179. 243. 255. 

Bacon, Theodore, 150. 

Baer, George F., 201. 

Baker, Newton D., 466. 

Ballinger, Richard A., 325. 328. 

Barnes, William, Jr., 419. 

Bayard, Senator, 50. 

Beebe, Capt. William, 393. 

Beecher, Henry Ward, 372. 

Beirut, Incident Relative to Vice Consul, 

213 et seq. 
Belgium, Position in Regard to 

Germany's Invasion, 459 et seq. 
Bell, John G., 392. 
Beveridge, Albert W., 371. 
Birth, 27. 

Black, Governor, 148, 150. 
Black Horse Cavalry, 61. 
Blaine, James G., 66, 84, 217. 320. 
Bonaparte, Charles J.. 198, 257. 
Books: Account and Criticisms of 

(Chapter XXIII), 432. 
Bourke, Edward J., 116. 
Boutros, Premier, 312. 
Brandeis, Louis D., 328. 
Brazil, Trip Through the Brazilian 

Wilderness, 405 et seq. 
Bridges, Robert. 434. 



Bristow, Joseph L., 198. 
Brookfield, William, 100. 
Brownson, Capt. W. H., 123. 
Brownson, Rear Admiral, 266. 
Brownsville, Affair at, 248. 
Bryan, William J.. 168, 231, 320. 
Bryce, James, 258. 
Bulloch, Anna, 33. 
Bulloch, Capt. James D., 28. 
Bulloch, Irvine Stephens, 29. 
Bullock, Seth, 78, 467. 
Bunau-Varilla, M. Philippe, 224 et seq. 
Burroughs, John, 309. 

Cabinet. Changes in, 204 et seq., 256 
et seq. 

Cairo, Speech at, 311. 

Cajazeira, Dr., 407. 

Campbell, ex-Governor, 112. 

Canal, The Panama (Chapter XIV), 
216 et seq. 

Canal, New York Canal Investigation, 
157 et seq. 

Cannon, Representative, 321. 

Capron, Captain Allyn, 143. 

Carow, Edith K. (Mrs. Theodore 
Roosevelt), 33, 193. 

Cherrie, George K.. 401, 407, 413. 

Childhood (Chapter II), 25 et seq. 

Citizens' Union Party, 149, 150. 

Civil Service Commissioner, Work as 
(Chapter VI), 84. 

Civil Service Law of New York. Work 
for. 57. 

Civil Service, White Civil Service Act of 
New York. 158. 

Civil War. 28, 32. 

Clark, Edward E., 204. 

Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, 217. 

Cleveland, Grover, 62, 67, 85, 91, 95, 202, 
218 

Coal Strike of 1902, 198 et seq. 

Colored Persons, Appointment to Federal 
Office, 194 et seq. 

Colored Persons, Attitude Towards Dele- 
gates in Progressive Convention, 373. 

Commissions, Work as Police Com- 
missioner (Chapter VII), 98 et seq. 

Conrad, Holmes, 198. 

Conservation of Natural Resources 
(Chapter XIX), 288 et seq. 



(475) 



476 



INDEX 



Conventions. See Political Conventions. 
Corporations, Attitude Towards, 274 et 

seq. 
Cortelyou, George B., 169, 172, 201, 206. 

231, 232, 256. 
Costello, Michael, 57, 63, 64, 65. 
Cowles, Mrs. Wm. S. See Roosevelt, 

Anna. 
Cox, Mrs. Minnie, 19*7. 
Crook, Colonel W. H., 178, 187, 436. 
Croker, Richard, 98, 151, 152. 
Crum, William D., 196. 
Cuba, Intervention, 1906, 243. 
Cuba, Relations With, During First 

Term, 207 et seq. 
Cummins, Senator, 346. 
Cuninghame, R. J., 301. 307, 308. 
Curtis, General, 57. 
Cutler, Arthur H., 37, 40. 
Czar of Russia, 314. 

de Barros, Senhor, 404. 

De Lesseps, 217. 

Democratic Conventions. See Political 

Conventions, 
de Mores, Marquis, 75. 
Depew, Chauncey M., 233. 
Derby, Mrs. Richard. See Roosevelt, 

Ethel. 
Dewey, Admiral George, 131, 211. 
Dewey, Roosevelt's Telegram to, 182. 
Dolliver, Senator, 163, 166. 
Dow, William, 39. 46, 69. 

Edmunds, Senator, 66. 

Edward, King, 237, 314 et seq. 

Elkhorn Ranch (Chapter V), 68. 

Elkins Act, 244 et seq. 

Emery, Rear Admiral William H., 268. 

Employers' Liability Act, 247. 

Europe, Journey Through, 1910, 312 et 

seq. 
European Addresses, 313 et seq. 
European Trips, 34, 42, 53. 
Evans, Rear Admiral Robley D., 127, 

266, 267. 

Ferris, J. A., 78. 

Ferris, S. N., 78. 

Fiala, Anthony, 401. 

Fish, Sergeant Hamilton, Jr., 143. 

Flinn, William, 348, 349, 378. 

Food and Drugs Act, 247 el seq. 

Foraker, Senator, 230. 

Ford Franchise Bill, 158. 

Ford, John, 158. 

Forest Homestead Act, 293. 

Forest Transfer Act, 291. 



Franchise Taxation, Ford Franchise Bill. 
158 et seq. 

Gage, Lyman J., 205. 

Garfield, James R., 50, 119, 173, 179, 257, 

325, 365, 378. 418, 425, 427, 467. 
Garrison, Lindley, 463. 
Gaynor, Mayor, 318. 
George, Henry, 84. 

Germany, Venezuelan Incident, 210 et seq. 
Glavis, 327. 
Glynn, Martin H., 460. 
Godkin, Lawrence, 100. 
Goethals, Colonel George W., 227. 
Goff, John, 80. 
Gomez, General, 244. 
Gorgas, Dr., 227. 
Gorman, Senator, 92, 125. 
Governor of New York, Term as 

(Chapter X), 148. 
Grant, Col. Frederick D., 101. 
Gray, Judge George, 204. 
Greene, General Francis V., 157. 
Grenell, Judson, 94. 
Grey, Earl, 315. 

Haakon, King, 313. 

Hadley, Governor, 357, 359, 366. 367. 

Hague Tribunal, 214, 263. 

Hale, Senator, 321. 

Hampden, John, Miniature, 237. 

Hanna, Mark, 163, 165, 199, 229. 

Harriman, E. H., 232, 233. 

Harrison, President William H., 84, 91, 

95, 173. 
Hart, Albert Bushnell, 46. 
Harvard University, 46 et seq. 
Hawley, Representative, 321. 
Hay, John, 151, 164, 168, 176, 210, 218. 

233, 236, 250, 257. 
Hay-Pauncefote Treaty, 218. 
Hay-Herran Treaty, 219. 
Hayes, President, 217. 
Hazel, Judge John R., 171. 
Heller, Edmund, 301. 
Hendricks, Francis, 85, 155. 
Hepburn, Representative, 186. 
Hepburn Rate Act, 245 et seq. 
Herran, Dr., 219, 220. 
Hess, Jacob, 56. 
Hewitt, Abram S., 84. 
Hill, Prof. Adams Sherman, 50. 
Hill, Senator David B., 114. 
Hinman, Harvey D., 419. 
Hitchcock, Ethan Allen, 171. 
Hobart, Garrett A., 163. 
Holleben, Dr. (German Ambassador), 

210. 






INDEX 



477 



Howe, Walter, 57. 
Hughes, Charles E., 422, 425, 427. 
Humphrey, Captain, 224. 
Hunt, Isaac, 57. 

Inaugural Address, 235 et seq. 
Inauguration, March 4, 1905, 235. 
Industrial Workers of the World. 285. 
Ingersoll, Col. Robert G., 66. 
Initiative, Position on, 339. 
Inland Waterways Commission, 297. 
Insurance, Appointment of New York 

State Superintendent of, 155 et seq. 
Ireland, Archbishop, 199. 

Jackson, Lieutenant Governor, 301. 
Japan, Treaty of Portsmouth, 238 et 

seq. 
Japanese, Exclusion from Schools, 241 

et seq. 
Johnson, Sir Harry, 389. 
Johnson, Hiram W., 360, 365, 378, 416. 
Johnston, George D., 86. 
Jones, Thomas G., 194. 
Joseph, Archduke, 313. 
Joseph, Emperor Francis, 313. 
Jusserand, M., 179. 

Kaiser, Wilhelm, 314. 

Kaneko, Baron, 239. 

Kellv, John, 110. 

Kelly, Peter, 57. 

Kettle Hill, 144. 

Khartoum, Arrival at, 311. 312, 328. 

Kipling, Rudyard, 175. 

Kirchwey, Dean George W., 374. 

Knox, Attorney-General Philander C, 

201, 206. 
Koester, George E., 194. 
Komura, Baron, 240. 
Kossuth, Francis, 313. 

Labor, Attitude Towards, 283 et seq. 

La Follette, Senator. 246, 333. 346, 347. 

Lambert. Dr. Alexander, 418 

Land Frauds, 278 et seq. 

Las Guasimas, Battle of, 143. 

Lee Alice Hathaway (Mrs. Theodore 

Roosevelt), 50, 51, 69. 
Legal Studies, 53. 
Leishman, Ambassador, 312. 
Leupp, Francis E., 121, 129, 195. 
Lexow Committee, 99. 
Libel Suits, Barnes vs. Roosevelt, 419 et 

seq. 
Libel Suits, Roosevelt w. Newett, 417 et 

seq. 
Lincoln. Abraham, 319, 330. 338. 339. 



Lindsey, Judge Ben B., 378. 

Llewellyn, Major, 79. 

Lodge, Senator, 47, 93, 94. 

Loeb. William. Jr., 170, 172, 418. 

Logan, John A., 66. 

Long. John, 46. 

Long, John D., Secretary of Navy, 127, 
131. 132, 133. 163, 171, 205. 

Longworth, Nicholas, 184. 

Longworth, Mrs. Nicholas. See Roose- 
velt. Alice. 

Loring. J. Alden. 301. 

Lusitania, Position in Regard to Sinking 
of, 461. 

Lyman, Charles, 86. 

Lyra, Lieutenant, 407. 409, 413. 

Magee, Christopher, 349. 

Magelssen, Consul at Beirut, 213. 

Magoon, Charles E., 244. 

Mahan, Admiral, 264. 

Maine, Sinking of the, 127. 

Maine, Visits to, 46. 

Maroquin, Vice-President, 219, 220. 

Martin, Elbert, 380. 

Marques, Senhor, 405. 

Marriage, 51, 193. 

McCarthy, Charles H., 374. 

McClain, Penrose A., 256. 

McCoach. William, 256. 

McCormick, Vance C, 441. 

McKinley. President William. 120, 125. 

166, 168, 169, 172. 
McKinley, William, Assassination of, 

169 et seq. 
McMullen, Prof., 40. 
Mearns, Lieutenant-Colonel Edgar A., 

301. 
Merriam. Dr. C. Hart, 389, 395. 
Merrifield, W. J., 78. 
Metcalf. Victor H.. 206. 257. 
Meyer, George. 71, 78. 
Meyer, George Von L.. 240, 257. 
Milburn. John G., 171. 
Miller, Leo E.„ 401. 414. 
Minot, Henry D., 392. 
Minuit, Peter, 25. 
Mitchell. John, 199. 201. 
Mitchell. Lex N.. 358. 
Monroe Doctrine, Treaty with Santo 

Domingo, 212 et seq. 
Moody, William H., 205, 206. 
Moore, Alexander P., 348. 
Morgan. J. Pierpont, 200, 203. 
Morley, John, 175. 
Morton. Paul. 206, 245. 
MUller, Lauro, 402. 
Murphy, Lieutenant, 224. 



478 



INDEX 



Murray, Joseph, 56. 
Murray, Lawrence, 179. 

Natural History, Studies in, 42, 44, 193. 
Naturalist, Position and Work as 

(Chapter XXV), 384 et seq. 
Navy, Services for, as President (Chapter 

XVII.), 259. 
Navy, Trip of Fleet Around World, 265 

et seq. 
Navy, Work as Assistant Secretary 

(Chapter VIII), 119 et seq. 
Negroes, Appointment to Federal Office, 

194 et seq. 
Negroes, Attitude Towards Delegates in 

Progressive Convention, 373. 
Nevada, Federal Troops Sent to, 287. 
New Nationalism, Address on, 330. 
New York Legislature, Member of 

(Chapter IV), 52. 
Newberry, Truman II., 257. 
Newbold, Thomas, 57. 
Newett, George A., 417, 418. 
New Grenada Treaty, 217. 
Nobel Prize Committee, Speech to, 313. 
Nobel Peace Prize, 241. 
North American Conservation Con- 
ference, 297. 
Northern Securities Company, 276. 

Odell, Benjamin B., 163, 165, 233. 

Ohio Constitutional Convention, Address 

Before. 338 et seq. 
O'Laughlin, John Callan, 328. 
Orchestra Hall, Nomination for President 

at, 364 
Ossawatomie, Speech at, 330. 

Palisades Interstate Park, 160. 

Palroa, President, 243. 

Panama Canal (Chapter XIV), 216 et 

seq. 
Parker, Judge Alton B., 231 et seq. 
Parker, Andrew D., 101. 
Parker, Edward W., 204. 
Parker, John M., 378, 428. 
Tartrid^e, John N., 154. 
Payn, Louis F., 155. 
Payne, Henry C, 197, 205, 207. 
Payne Tariff Bill, 326. 
Pease, Sir Alfred, 303. 
Pepper, George Wharton, 328. 
Perkins, George W., 423. 
Pinchot, Gifford. 178, 179, 251, 327, 328. 

370, 373, 378, 415, 418, 441. 
Pinchot-Glavis-Builinger Controversy, 

827 et seq. 



Pious Fund of the Californias, 214. 
Piatt, Senator, 148, 153. 156, 158, 162, 

165, 207, 255, 419. 
Plimley, William, 255. 
Police Commissioner, Work as (Chapter 

VII), 98 et seq. 
Political Campaigns: 
1884, 66, 67. 
1898, for Governor of New York, 

148 et seq. 
1886, for Mayor of New York, 84. 
1916, for Mr. Justice Hughes, 428 

et seq. 
1904. for President (Chapter XV). 

229 et seq. 
1912, for President, 378 et seq. 
1914, for Progressive Party candi- 
dates, 415 et seq. 
Reason for becoming candidate for 
Republican nomination, 1912, 333 
et seq. 
For the Republican nomination, 
1912 (Chapter XXIIL), 346 et seq. 
Republican nomination, 1916, 420 

et seq. 
1900, for Vice President, 166 et seq. 
Political Conventions: 

Democratic, 1912, 379. 

Progressive Convention, 1912, 370 

et seq. 
Progressive, 1916, 423 et seq. 
Republican, 1884, 66. 
Republican, N. Y. State Convention, 

1898. 150. 
Republican, 1900, 164 et seq. 
Republican, 1904, 230. 
Republican, 1908, 323 et seq. 
Republican, 1912, 354 et seq. 
Republican, 1916, 422 et seq. 
Portsmouth, Treaty of, 238 et seq. 
Portsmouth, N. IL, 240. 
Post Office Department, Frauds in, 197 

et seq. 
Potter, Bishop, 199. 
Potter, William, 134. 
Pound, James H., 417. 
Preparedness, Position on, 464. 
Presidency, Life Ir White House (Chap- 
ter XII.), 175 et seq. 
Presidency, First Term (Chapter XIII), 

194 et seq. 
Presidency, Second Term (Chapter 

XVI.), 238 et seq. 
Presidential Commissions, Contention 

over, 325. 
Proctor, John R., 86. 



INDEX 



479 



Progressive Movement. Beginning* of 
(Chapter XXI), 319 et teq. 
Formation of P rogre ss ive Party 

(Chapter XXIV), 368 et teq. 
Ideas on Direct Control of People 
over Government (Chapter 
XXII), 336 etteq. 
Platforms of Progressive Party, 876, 
424. 427. 
Progressive Party after 1912 (Chapter 

XXVII.), 415. 
Public Land Commission, 294. 

Quay. Senator Matthew S., 203, 256, 259. 
Quigg, Lemuel K., 148. 
Quincy, Josiah, 46. 

Ranch Life (Chapter V), 68. 

Ranquet. M.. 811. 

Raphael, Otto, 104. 

Recall of Executive Officers, Position on, 

840. 
Recall of Judges, Position on, 840. 
Recall of Judicial Decisions, Position on. 

841 et seq. 
Referendum, Position on, 839. 
Republican Conventions. See Political 

Conventions. 
Republican National Committee. 1912, 

Contests before, 351 et teq. 
Riis, Jacob A.. 75. 106, 183, 186, 417. 
River of Doubt, 407 et teq. 
Robb, Hampden. 57. 
Robbins, Raymond, 370. 378, 424, 467. 
Robins, Thomas, 430. 452, 456. 
Robinson, Mrs. Douglas. See Roosevelt, 

Corinne. 
Robinson, Mrs. Douglas; Sketch of 

Roosevelt's Childhood, 35. 
Rondon, Colonel. 402, 408, 407, 410, 411, 

414. 
Roosevelt, Alice L., 184. 
Roosevelt, Anna (Mrs. William S. 

Cowles), 88. 
Roosevelt, Archibald B., 184 et seq. 
Roosevelt, Cornelius Van Schaack. 26, 

48. 
Roosevelt, Corrinne (Mrs. Douglas Rob- 
inson), 33, 35. 335. 
Roosevelt, Elliott. 33, 35. 38. 43. 
Roosevelt. Ethel (Mrs. Richard Derby). 

184 311 
Roose'velt. Kermit. 184. 801. 807. 311. 

401, 407. 408. 418. 415. 471. 
Roosevelt, Klaes Martensen Van, 25. 
Roosevelt, Quentin, 184 et teq. 
Roosevelt, Robert B., 84. 



Roosevelt, Mrs. Theo. (Alice Lee Hath- 
away), 69. 
Roosevelt. Mrs. Theo. (Edith Kermit 

Carow). 182, 188, 811, 854. 856. 881. 

426. 444, 449, 470, 471. 
Roosevelt, Theodore, Jr.. 186, 471. 
Roosevelt. Theodore, Sr.. 26 et teq. SO, 44, 

52. 
Roosevelt, Mrs. Theo., Sr., 81 et eeq., 

69. 
Roosevelt, W. Emlen. 450. 
Root, Elihu. 164. 171, 208, 206, 280, 257, 

858. 460. 
Rosen, Baron, 239. 
Rosewater, Victor, 857, 861. 
Rough Riders (Chapter IX). 134 et teq. 
Rowell, Chester A.. 373, 375. 
Russia, Treaty of Portsmouth, 238 et 

teq. 
Russo-Japanese Treaty, 313. 

Sagamore Hill. Life at (Chapter XXIX). 

441. 
San Juan Hill, Battle of, 144 et teq. 
Santo Domingo, Treaty with, 212 et 

teq. 
Schiff, Jacob H., 112. 
Schofield. Major-General, 203. 
Schrank. John. 381. 
Schurz. Carl, 112. 
Secretary of the Navy, Work as (Chapter 

VIII.). 119* wo. 
Selous, Frederick Courteney, SOL 
Sewall, William, 39. 46. 69. 
Shafter, General, 146. 
Shaw. Albert. 222. 417. 
Shaw, Leslie M.. 205. 
Sheldon. George R., 255. 
Sherman Anti-Trust Act. 274 et teq. 
Sherman. Vice-President, 238. 
Shidy Case. 89. 
Sigg. Jacob, 401, 405, 407. 
Sloan, James. 178. 
Smith, Charles Emory, 171, 205. 
Smith, Herbert Knox, 179. 
Sorbonne Address. 313. 
South American Trip (Chapter XXIV), 

401. 
Southern Appointments. Policy as to. 

194 et teq. 
Spanish War (Chapter IX). 1S4 et teq. 
Sperry. C. S.. 268, 270. 
Sprague, Henry, 57. 
Standard Oil Company, 245. 
Stewart, General Daniel, 32. 
Stimson, Henry L., 467. 
Stone, Governor, 200. 
Stone. Witmer. 384, S85. 



480 



INDEX 



Straus. Oscar S„ 258. 

Strung, William L., 100. 101, 100. 

Sullivan. John L., 189. 

Taft, William H., 206, 243. 257, 301, 320, 

325, 329, 334. 347, 351. 
Takahira, Mr., 240. 
Tardieu, Andre, 182. 
Tarlton, Leslie, 301, 306. 
Tenement House Investigation, N. Y. 

City, 100. 
Tennessee Coal & Iron Co., 281 et $eq. 
Thayer, William R., 53, 161. 
Thomas, C. M., 268. 
Thompson, Hugh S., 86. 
Tillman, Senator, 246. 
Treaty, Cuban Reciprocity, 207 et teq. 
Treaty, Portsmouth, 238. 
Treaty, with Republic of Panama, 225. 
Trusts, Attitude Towards, 274 et $eq. 

United Mine Workers of America, 199. 
United States Steel Corporation, 275. 

van Duzer, Jonas. 57. 
von Sternberg, Baron Speck. 161. 
Van Valkenburg, E. A., 348. 
Van Wyck, Augustus, 150. 
Vatican Incident, 312. 
Venezuela. German Incident, 210 et seq. 
Vice President (Chapter IX), 168 et 
teq. 



Walker. Admiral. 219. 

Ward. Mn. Humphrey, 315. 

Waring, Colonel George E., 100. 

Warner, Mrs. Langdon, 451. 

Warren, Herbert, 237. 

Washington, Booker T., 195. 

Watkins. Thomas II., 204. 

Welch, Thomas, 57. 

Western Federation of Miners, 285. 

Wheeler, Everett P., 100. 

Wheeler, General "Fighting Joe". 142. 
White. Henry. 164. * 

White House, Roosevelt's Life in 

(Chapter XII). 175. 
White, Dr. J. William, 384. 
Whitman, Governor, 470. 
Wileo*. Ansley. 171. 
Willis. John, 80. 
Wilson, General John M., 204. 
Wilson, Woodrow, 379. 
Wingatc, Sir Reginald. 311. 
Witte, Sergius, 240. 
Wood, Leonard. 134, 135, 142, 179, 207. 

418, 463. 
Woodruff, Timothy L., 164. 
Woody, Tazewell, 80. 
World War, Services in, 459. 
Wright, Carroll D., 201. 
Wright. Luke E., 258. 
Wynne, Robert J., 207. 

Young, General S. M. B.. 143. 

Zahm, Father, 401, 407. 



